Kazakh Minister of Science and Higher Education Sayasat Nurbek and representatives from other Kazakh universities took part in the round table, where they discussed the development of innovation ecosystems in local universities. Sayasat Nurbek noted that the ministry plans to support university science by establishing science-intensive places, similar to special economic zones.
“The government is paying special attention to science right now. Many milestones have been achieved over the past few years. As part of the Research and Academic Excellence Program, we fund and provide many universities with laboratories. It is important for us, for the scientific community, to incentivize businesses to invest in products made using science and increase their added value. Basically, what we managed to create with NURIS, a small model in the ecosystem of NU, we now need to replicate in other universities,” the minister noted.
During his visit to NU, the minister learned about the startups that have completed and acceleration programs under the NU Research and Innovation Cluster. These innovative ventures include, among others:
Artisan Education – a platform to independently study robotics from scratch and become an engineer in the field of IoT;
OncoZero.AI – an artificial intelligence for automated diagnosis of early stages of cancer using CT images;
Alpha-kid – an educational mobile application for children that automatically limits screen time;
Multicode – the first multimodal logistics and cargo transportation company.
“It is crucial for young people to explore technological entrepreneurship and understand the potential to make money from science and technology. More than 500 participants have benefited from 25 NURIS programs, attracting over $5 million in investments over the past decade, with the primary contributions originating from external business sources. We will be happy to help universities in Kazakhstan to create their own innovation ecosystems and share our experiences. We have ready-made methodologies to support startups, to foster creative engineering communities and corporate innovations,” emphasized Abzal Daribayev, NURIS Innovation Development Director.
Overall, 19 EdTech, MedTech, FinTech, HRTech, E-Commerce startups presented their companies during the Demo Day. All of them completed the ABC Inc x TCA business incubation and Quick Start accelerator programs of the NURIS Innovation Cluster.
