"The digital future of Kazakhstan begins here, at Astana Hub. We strive to create all the conditions for you to realize your dreams and succeed in the IT field. Perhaps, in this room, there are future founders and startups - individuals whose activities in the IT sector will change our world," welcomed the festival participants Alina Abdrakhmanova, Managing Director of Astana Hub.

During the event, IT industry experts and startup founders shared their experience and knowledge about the past and future of information technology, current trends, and professions in IT. Innovative startups also showcased their technologies, including the metaverse, avatars, robots, energy-efficient scooters, and more.

"I gained a lot of useful information. It was interesting to learn about cybersecurity. I understood that it's necessary to limit information about myself on the internet because personal data can end up freely accessible, and that's not right. We were also told about which websites are safe to browse and which ones are dangerous," shared 10th-grade student Zarina Doszhanova from the Kostanay region. As part of the BeginIT project, she completed a digital design course and now plans to take on orders as a budding specialist.

BeginIT is a social-educational project by the company inDrive, helping children from rural areas take their first steps in the IT field. Last year, 327 students from 17 regions of the country participated in the project. They learned programming on the platform, digital design, No Code, etc. With the help of trackers, they developed their projects - analogs of Kaspi and Krisha applications within a few months without coding.

"To participate in the festival, we invited the best forty students who excelled in IT courses throughout the academic year, actively participated in hackathons, and solved mathematical tasks. We want to offer them to become ambassadors of our project," noted inDrive representative Ersain Kabdrashev.

As part of BeginIT, rural students are provided with educational platform licenses for self-paced asynchronous learning of programming and other digital skills. Short-term educational programs (3 months) with professional experts as trackers are also organized for them. Motivational meetings, festivals, and demo days are conducted. The project operates in 13 countries worldwide: Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, Chile, Peru, South Africa, Tanzania, Nigeria, India, and Pakistan.