Kazakhstan plans to raise $75 million from the World Bank for AI and startup development

The budget is divided into three main blocks:

• $39.85 million will be directed to support startups. This includes assistance at stages from idea to seed funding, acceleration programs, and bringing projects to the international level. A portion of the funds will go to a venture fund to stimulate private investment in IT and green technologies.
• $30 million will be allocated for infrastructure and personnel. Plans include creating an AI Center, launching cloud platforms, opening robotics laboratories, and specialized training programs.
• $5.2 million is budgeted for project management, monitoring, and analyzing gaps in the innovation ecosystem.

The country and the market

Kazakhstan is actively declaring its plans to become a regional hub for artificial intelligence development. While the private sector is selectively implementing technologies — for example, Finteqstan previously wrote that Halyk Bank is preparing to launch its own AI assistant — the state needs to create a basic infrastructure. Without local cloud capacities and specialized professionals, scaling heavy neural networks at the national level is impossible.

A year earlier, the relevant ministry had already raised a World Bank loan of 42 billion tenge. At that time, the focus was on developing telecommunications infrastructure in rural areas.

Why it matters and what’s next

The state is taking on the financing of the most capital-intensive and risky stages: creating a computing base and supporting startups at the idea stage.

Now the market will have to follow the September negotiations. If the loan is approved, local IT companies and fintech startups will have a new major source of funding and access to computing power starting in 2027.