Country’s Largest Hackathon, Decentrathon 5.0, Involving 3,000 IT Specialists from 20 Cities of Kazakhstan, Launched at Digital Qazaqstan Forum in Shymkent

Today in Shymkent, as part of the international technology forum Digital Qazaqstan, Decentrathon 5.0 was officially launched – the country’s largest multi-location hackathon, uniting developers from across the nation.

Opening the competition, Deputy Prime Minister – Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Development of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Zhaslan Madiev, emphasized that in today’s reality, technological leadership is determined by a state’s ability to create an environment for generating applied solutions and skilled personnel; therefore, developing AI and digital competencies is a matter of national competitiveness.

This year, the hackathon, organized by the Ministry of Digital Development, Innovations and Aerospace Industry jointly with Astana Hub international technopark and the Blockchain & AI Technology Center (BAITC), has achieved a unique scale: over 3,000 developers from 20 cities of Kazakhstan will spend ten days working on real-world challenges from global industry giants such as inDrive and Solana Superteam Kazakhstan, with a total prize fund of 20 million tenge.

A key feature of this anniversary hackathon is the socio-governmental focus of the technical assignments. inDrive has challenged participants to apply artificial intelligence to solve priority tasks in the public sector.

Specifically, developers are tasked with creating an AI system for automatic analysis of legislation, capable of identifying conflicting regulations in acts from different government bodies governing the same activity. This will ensure unprecedented transparency of the regulatory framework. The second task involves implementing AI scoring for agricultural producers when awarding subsidies, guaranteeing targeted and maximally efficient use of budget funds.

Concurrently, Solana Superteam Kazakhstan presented tasks for developing Web3 products and services based on the Solana blockchain ecosystem, aimed at launching global technological solutions capable of scaling to millions of users worldwide.

According to CEO of Astana Hub, Magzhan Madiev, AI is significantly lowering entry barriers to development and effectively democratizing the creation of technological products. That is why the hackathon format has become longer this year, allowing participants to focus on creating viable products within the ecosystem, the best of which will receive support through the hub’s acceleration programs.

CTO of inDrive, Yuri Misnik, emphasized that for the global platform, partnering with Decentrathon is an opportunity not only to share expertise in scalable infrastructure and data but also, together with the government, to stimulate healthy competition that helps new technological leaders emerge – whose ideas bring real benefits to society and public services.

The best teams will have the opportunity to continue working on their solutions at the ALEM AI international artificial intelligence center, with prospects for further project development and implementation.

“It is important for us that the teams’ work does not end at the hackathon stage but continues within the ecosystem,” noted Aidana Kaskyrbek, CEO of the Blockchain & AI Technology Center.

Decentrathon 5.0 goes beyond a regular competition, becoming a foundation for long-term technological partnerships and a strategic contribution to the Year of Digitalization and Artificial Intelligence, which will ensure a sustainable influx of innovation and a high-quality transformation of the entire IT industry in Kazakhstan.

Details on the website: https://decentrathon.ai/?utm_source=pr&utm_medium=news