Yandex Qazaqstan and Activat VC Announced the Winners of Clash of Startups

On March 12, Activat VC and Yandex Qazaqstan held the Clash of Startups meetup. The event brought together startups from applied AI, fintech, urban services, martech and other fields.

The meetup also featured a panel discussion, where experts from venture funds explained how they assess the technology side of a startup. The discussion was moderated by Nikita Razhev, Head of Startup Programs and Commercial Initiatives at Yandex Cloud.

At the pitch session, startup founders presented their solutions to the jury, who reviewed each case and shared their feedback.

The jury included:

• Aslan Sultanov, Managing Partner at White Hill Capital;

• Zhan Karsybayev, Managing Partner at Big Sky Capital;

• Baurzhan Shalbayev, CIO of MOST Ventures;

• Askar Bilisbekov, CEO of Qazaqstan Venture Group;

• Timur Shalekenov, CEO of Yandex Qazaqstan;

• Meirzhan Yessimkhanov, Executive Director of Activat VC;

• Shakhzod Narzullaev, Investment Manager at IT Park Ventures.

Following the pitches, the jury selected three finalists, who received grants for Yandex Cloud services.

A grant of 6 million tenge went to Kamila Dautkanova, co-founder of BookEat, a tech platform for restaurants that brings table booking, pre-ordering, guest flow management and analytics together in a single app. Abylai Bazarbayev, who presented UGC Match, a platform for launching native brand advertising through bloggers and UGC creators, also received a 6 million grant.

A grant of 3 million tenge was awarded to Nikita Bykov of the startup Qutty Band, a smart fitness band that tracks basic physiological needs using proprietary algorithms and a localized interface.