Presight signs deal to build AI Urban OS for Almaty
MOU sets foundation for intelligent city infrastructure across Kazakhstan’s largest city
#Kazakhstan #SmartCities – ADX-listed big data analytics company Presight has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the City of Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest city, to develop a unified, AI-enabled urban operating system covering mobility, public safety and municipal services. The agreement establishes a joint roadmap for designing and deploying intelligent urban systems across the city’s core infrastructure. A planned AI data centre forms a key pillar of the partnership, designed to power real-time city operations and support long-term sovereign AI deployment at scale. The deal builds on Presight’s existing presence in Kazakhstan, which includes the Astana smart city project and an AI supercomputer deployment.
SO WHAT? – With a population of over two million, Almaty is Kazakhstan’s commercial and cultural capital. The new Presight agreement positions the city to leapfrog incremental digitalisation toward something more ambitious: a unified operational layer where AI is embedded directly into how the city functions in real time. The deal also further expands the Abu Dhabi company’s national footprint in Kazakhstan that already includes sovereign AI infrastructure in the capital Astana.
KEY POINTS:
ADX-listed big data analytics company Presight has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the City of Almaty to develop next-generation urban infrastructure and accelerate the city’s digital transformation. The agreement was signed by Presight CEO Thomas Pramotedham and Almaty Mayor Darkhan Satybaldy.
The partnership centres on building a unified, AI-enabled urban operating system. Presight describes this as an integrated intelligence layer embedded directly into the city’s core infrastructure, rather than a collection of separate digital tools. The goal is a single operational framework covering mobility, public safety and municipal services.
A planned AI data centre is a key pillar of the collaboration. Presight and the City government will jointly assess requirements spanning compute capacity, network architecture, energy provision, cooling, security and site location, ensuring the infrastructure is designed to support long-term, scalable deployment of sovereign intelligent systems.
Specific urban systems targeted under the agreement include intelligent transport systems, digital platforms for public services, and real-time city management and situational command centres powered by data and AI. Together these form the operational backbone of the proposed urban intelligence layer.
Joint technical, regulatory, financial and economic studies will evaluate project viability and quantify expected impact, grounding the partnership in measurable outcomes rather than aspirational targets.
Knowledge exchange and ecosystem development are built into the agreement, including engagement with the Almaty AI Hub and the potential establishment of a regional Presight office to support long-term delivery and local capability building across Kazakhstan.
The City of Almaty deal builds on Presight’s established presence in Kazakhstan, giving the Almaty partnership a foundation of proven in-country execution. The company already operates a local office and has delivered the Astana smart city project and an AI supercomputer deployment in the capital.
Presight is an ADX-listed public company and a global leader in applied AI for intelligent systems, operating across infrastructure, capital and societal systems.
ZOOM OUT – The Almaty MOU is the next chapter of Presight’s Kazakhstan business that the company has been systematically building over the past few years. In May last year, Presight opened its Central Asia hub at the Astana International Financial Centre, inaugurated during the official visit of Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. The office launch coincided with a $190 million, six-year smart city agreement with the City of Astana,. Under the Astana project, Presight is creating a full digital twin of the city, with 60 percent of the project scope managed by Kazakhstani companies. With more than 40 local staff already employed in Astana and now a potential second regional office planned for Almaty, Presight is building the kind of in-country presence that turns individual project wins into long-term national infrastructure partnerships.
[Written and edited with the assistance of AI]
Read more about Presight’s expansion in Kazakhstan:
Presight establishes first Central Asia R&D lab (Middle East AI News)
Kazakhstan unveils first national supercomputer (Middle East AI News)
Presight opens Central Asia hub in Kazakh capital Astana (Middle East AI News)
Inception & MBZUAI unveil Kazakh LLM (Middle East AI News)
Presight secures $190 million Smart City deal with Astana (Middle East AI News)