As part of the joint project by Digital Business and Astana Hub, “100 Startup Stories of Central Asia,” Umed shared what the initial idea behind Stanbase was and how the service differs from similar international platforms. We also learned how much money the founders have already invested in product development, how the startup plans to generate revenue, and which areas it will focus on over the next year.
“It Seemed Like My Maximum Was Becoming a Computer Science Teacher”
— Umed, how did your journey in IT begin?
— I became interested in IT while still at school, and when choosing a university, I considered this field. However, in my senior years, I knew almost nothing about IT. It seemed like my maximum was becoming a computer science teacher.
I enrolled at Tajik National University and, in my first year, got a job as a project manager at the startup Nexus Tajikistan — an analogue of HeadHunter in Tajikistan. When the lockdown began, the project shut down. At the same time, people in the country started massively switching to Telegram for communication. As a result, I launched the Telegram channel tajwork, where I posted job vacancies.
The community began to grow and eventually evolved into a full-fledged platform, vazifa.tj. With this project, I went through the PEAK Tajikistan accelerator, and in 2023 we launched monetization. Today, it is one of the largest job search platforms in the country.
— However, you have been living in Tashkent for the past two years. How did you end up in Uzbekistan?
— At the beginning of 2023, we wanted to scale into Uzbekistan, so I moved to Tashkent. But we didn’t fully assess the market situation and eventually abandoned the idea. Initially, I planned to set up processes and return home, but I decided to stay. I worked as a project manager on various projects, tried to integrate into the local IT community, and at the same time continued developing vazifa.tj in the home market.
— When did the idea for Stanbase appear?
— Since 2020, I’ve also been running a personal Telegram channel where I talk about IT companies, products, and people in Central Asia. While preparing posts, I looked for data on deals, funding rounds, and other industry news. There was enough information, but it was scattered across many different sources: local media, foreign platforms for finding information about companies, investments, and markets such as Crunchbase, Dealroom, and others.
At the beginning of this year, I sold my stake and exited vazifa.tj. I started thinking about what to do next. Initially, we planned to create an HR-tech product for recruiters hiring IT specialists. However, after some time, we realized this was not the most viable niche and pivoted the idea toward the Stanbase concept.
— What is it about?
— We are working to make Stanbase a unified platform where all investment-related information about the region is collected and accessible. Starting in August this year, we have been gathering data on startups, venture funds, business angels, and investment news in Central Asia.
At the moment, we have collected 80% of all news about deals across the region for 2022–2025. Based on this data, we conduct R&D: we study market dynamics, track anomalies and patterns, understand where investments are most often directed and with what ticket sizes, which funds are the most active, and so on.
— How does Stanbase differ from similar international platforms?
— The main difference is content localization. Crunchbase focuses primarily on American startups, while Dealroom mainly works with Europe and only recently launched in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. However, all the data they have on our region was collected with the help of Astana Hub and IT Park Uzbekistan. The problem with this approach is that the information will not be updated regularly. Our goal is to keep it constantly up to date, because doing this locally is much easier than from abroad.
Read more on Digitalbusiness.kz.
As part of the joint project by Digital Business and Astana Hub, “100 Startup Stories of Central Asia,” Umed shared what the initial idea behind Stanbase was and how the service differs from similar international platforms. We also learned how much money the founders have already invested in product development, how the startup plans to generate revenue, and which areas it will focus on over the next year.
“It Seemed Like My Maximum Was Becoming a Computer Science Teacher”
— Umed, how did your journey in IT begin?
— I became interested in IT while still at school, and when choosing a university, I considered this field. However, in my senior years, I knew almost nothing about IT. It seemed like my maximum was becoming a computer science teacher.
I enrolled at Tajik National University and, in my first year, got a job as a project manager at the startup Nexus Tajikistan — an analogue of HeadHunter in Tajikistan. When the lockdown began, the project shut down. At the same time, people in the country started massively switching to Telegram for communication. As a result, I launched the Telegram channel tajwork, where I posted job vacancies.
The community began to grow and eventually evolved into a full-fledged platform, vazifa.tj. With this project, I went through the PEAK Tajikistan accelerator, and in 2023 we launched monetization. Today, it is one of the largest job search platforms in the country.
— However, you have been living in Tashkent for the past two years. How did you end up in Uzbekistan?
— At the beginning of 2023, we wanted to scale into Uzbekistan, so I moved to Tashkent. But we didn’t fully assess the market situation and eventually abandoned the idea. Initially, I planned to set up processes and return home, but I decided to stay. I worked as a project manager on various projects, tried to integrate into the local IT community, and at the same time continued developing vazifa.tj in the home market.
— When did the idea for Stanbase appear?
— Since 2020, I’ve also been running a personal Telegram channel where I talk about IT companies, products, and people in Central Asia. While preparing posts, I looked for data on deals, funding rounds, and other industry news. There was enough information, but it was scattered across many different sources: local media, foreign platforms for finding information about companies, investments, and markets such as Crunchbase, Dealroom, and others.
At the beginning of this year, I sold my stake and exited vazifa.tj. I started thinking about what to do next. Initially, we planned to create an HR-tech product for recruiters hiring IT specialists. However, after some time, we realized this was not the most viable niche and pivoted the idea toward the Stanbase concept.
— What is it about?
— We are working to make Stanbase a unified platform where all investment-related information about the region is collected and accessible. Starting in August this year, we have been gathering data on startups, venture funds, business angels, and investment news in Central Asia.
At the moment, we have collected 80% of all news about deals across the region for 2022–2025. Based on this data, we conduct R&D: we study market dynamics, track anomalies and patterns, understand where investments are most often directed and with what ticket sizes, which funds are the most active, and so on.
— How does Stanbase differ from similar international platforms?
— The main difference is content localization. Crunchbase focuses primarily on American startups, while Dealroom mainly works with Europe and only recently launched in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. However, all the data they have on our region was collected with the help of Astana Hub and IT Park Uzbekistan. The problem with this approach is that the information will not be updated regularly. Our goal is to keep it constantly up to date, because doing this locally is much easier than from abroad.
Read more on Digitalbusiness.kz.
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