Kazakhstan's Digital Leap: 92% Public Services Online, Billions in AI Exports

Kazakhstan's digital leap is a case study in rapid transformation, with 92% of public services now online and IT service exports hitting $1 billion. In under a decade, the "Digital Kazakhstan" program has delivered over 54 million services via its eGov Mobile app, connected thousands of rural settlements to high-speed internet, and deployed advanced smart city technology in its capital. This success is so significant that Kazakhstan's digital leap is so big that it's now sharing its technology with other cities and even boosting its IT exports.

How has Kazakhstan achieved rapid digital transformation and smart city development?

Through its "Digital Kazakhstan" program, the nation moved 92% of its public services online and generated $1 billion in IT service exports. This was achieved by connecting 2,600 rural areas to high-speed internet and deploying advanced smart city AI platforms, including extensive camera networks in Astana.

Metric (end-2025)	Value
IT service exports	USD 1 billion
Public services online	92 %
Rural settlements connected	2 600
Data-center capacity added	7.4 MW
Supercomputer rank (TOP500)	#86

In January 2026 President Tokayev signed an executive order that makes the entire year the "Year of Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence", putting the Presidential Administration in direct control of a new three-year sprint to full digital governance.

The foundational hardware is already in place. The national AI center alem.ai operates Central Asia's first supercomputing cluster, Alem.Cloud, built with NVIDIA H200 chips and ranked 86th on the global TOP500. Three additional data centers offering a combined 12.9 MW are scheduled for 2026, while operators plan to connect another 1,900 villages to fiber. Government sessions chaired by Prime Minister Olzhas Bektenov have set a goal of training one million citizens in AI skills by 2030 and directed every ministry to embed AI in its operations.

• Astana's USD 190 million city-scale experiment is the most prominent showcase of these capabilities. A six-year contract signed in February 2025 with Abu Dhabi-based Presight provides the capital with an AI platform that unifies 15 municipal and national systems into one City Situation Center. More than 22,000 cameras feed a VideoBrain module that applies 35 real-time analytics - including facial recognition and traffic-flow prediction - while an adaptive traffic-light network is expected to cut peak congestion by up to 18%. A digital twin fuses video, utility, and service data, allowing emergency crews to run five-minute scenario simulations before dispatch.

Over 20,000 additional smart cameras will go live before 2026 closes, turning Astana into one of the largest single-city deployments of AI-driven video analytics outside China.

A key localization clause ensures Kazakh firms perform 60% of the integration work, fostering domestic expertise in computer vision, DevOps, and cybersecurity. This successful blueprint is now being replicated, with the cabinet directing Astana to package its platform for use in Almaty, Shymkent, and Karaganda, thereby expanding the market for local integrators.

Industry analysts note this progress aligns with a global inflection point. The worldwide smart-city industry is valued at USD 2.7-2.8 trillion by 2027, with an AI segment forecast at USD 298 billion. While North America currently leads, Eurasia is the fastest-growing region, giving Kazakhstan strategic leverage as both chair of the EAEU and host of the region's only TOP500 supercomputer.

Enterprise demand is already visible. A recent Almaty conference highlighted a shift by major retail, pharma, and telecom companies from legacy systems to cloud-native platforms that use the same expanding data-center infrastructure. Localization kits that ensure data sovereignty and offer multilingual interfaces are removing final regulatory hurdles, while experience from over 30 enterprise roll-outs is informing public-sector projects.

Whether future IT exports are driven by smart-city solutions, AI start-ups, or traditional industries leveraging new data infrastructure, the common foundation is the platform built by "Digital Kazakhstan." With the presidential 2026 mandate adding political urgency and Astana's smart city serving as a scalable model, Kazakhstan is no longer just buying a digital future - it is building and selling one.