On October 5, 2024, as part of the Aqmola birthday celebration The Hub hosted the Birthday Pizza Pitch Kokshetau, a key event for the startup community of the Akmola region. This event attracted a lot of attention from both the local community and industry professionals. With each new pitch, viewers and experts increasingly note a significant increase in the level of submitted projects.

The event gathered a full hall, demonstrating not only the high interest in startups in the region, but also the desire of the public to support new innovative solutions.

Birthday Pizza Pitch Kokshetau once again confirmed that startups in the region are gaining strength, and the quality of training of participants is becoming more impressive every time. A member of the jury, Sarzhan Muratov, tracker of Startup Garage and Techpreneurs programs, chief judge and expert of Technovation Global, shared his impressions: "Being a native of Kokshetau, I am glad to contribute to the development of the IT startup community in the region. This Pizza Pitch surprised with a variety of startups that covered such areas as Edtech, Game dev, Greentech, Smart city and Hardware. I was particularly impressed by the level of preparation of the teams, many of which presented working MVPs, such as the startup KTED with more than 500 downloads. I hope that the feedback from the jury will help the participants on their way to monetization." Also noting the importance of using the Kazakh language in the startup environment, emphasizing that the regions Kazakhstan is a "diamond talent quarry" that requires further support and development.

The organizers express their gratitude to all participants, jury members and the audience for their contribution to the development of the startup ecosystem of the region. There are even more interesting events ahead that will help startups in the region reach a new level of development.

The winners of the event:

1️ - "KTED" - Computer and mobile game for studying the history of Kazakhstan

2️ - "Second Vision" - Glasses for navigation in space for visually impaired people

3️ - "Solar Tracker" - Tracker for solar panels, solar tracking system

List of jury members:

• Gulim Begalina – Head of KSU "Smart Aqmola"

• Bibigul Tolegul – Head of the KSU Business Incubator. Sh.Ualikhanov

• Ondasyn Orazov – Deputy Vice-Rector of KUAM

• Janelle Usmanova – Senior Manager of the Regional Development Office of the International Technopark of IT Startups "Astana Hub"

• Sarzhan Muratov – Startup tracker of incubation programs "Startup Garage", "Techpreneurs"