TLDR: The Institute of Smart Systems and Artificial Intelligence (ISSAI) at Nazarbayev University has unveiled a groundbreaking suite of five AI technologies, including multilingual AI assistants, advanced speech engines, and secure local inference servers. Developed entirely by Kazakhstani professionals, these innovations mark a significant step towards the nation’s self-reliance and cultural alignment in artificial intelligence.
ASTANA – On July 17, 2025, the Institute of Smart Systems and Artificial Intelligence (ISSAI) at Nazarbayev University announced the launch of a new generation of artificial intelligence technologies, all designed, developed, and deployed by Kazakhstani experts. This significant unveiling positions Kazakhstan at the forefront of culturally grounded and linguistically inclusive AI, reinforcing its journey toward self-reliance and infrastructure independence in the field.
Following the successful introduction of the KazLLM large language model in December 2024, ISSAI has now introduced five breakthrough products. Dr. Huseyin Atakan Varol, Founding Director of ISSAI, emphasized the profound significance of this achievement, stating, “Everything unveiled today is the result of local innovation — from data collection to engineering and deployment. This marks not only a technological milestone, but a cultural one. Kazakhstan is proving that it can build state-of-the-art intelligent systems for its own people, in its own language, on its own terms — powered by the talents of local researchers, engineers, and data scientists.”
The newly unveiled technologies include:
Oylan 2.5: A powerful multilingual multimodal AI assistant capable of operating in Kazakh, Russian, and English. This updated version supports both Cyrillic and Latin scripts for Kazakh, allowing users to ask questions via text or voice, receive detailed answers, upload images for analysis, retrieve trusted online or document-based information, and display math formulas or code, making it ideal for students and developers.
MangiSoz 2.0: A robust speech recognition, synthesis, and translation engine that supports real-world speech processing across Kazakh, Russian, English, Turkish, and Chinese.
TilSync: A system offering real-time video translation with subtitles, particularly beneficial for online education and conferences.
Beynele: An innovative tool that transforms written text into images, incorporating a traditional Kazakh artistic style.
Mangitas 02: A secure local server designed to enable offline use of artificial intelligence, thereby addressing critical data protection and privacy concerns.
Four of these five systems are already operational on the ISSAI platform, with the fifth expected to launch by the end of the year. Access to these services is initially free, with certain usage limits. For instance, Oylan 2.5 provides 250,000 tokens free of charge, which is estimated to last an average user approximately six months. Beyond this free tier, users will be charged 4,000 tenge (approximately US$7.5) per million tokens.
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Dr. Varol highlighted that while the equipment for these systems was sourced internationally, all the underlying technologies were developed entirely within Kazakhstan by local researchers and engineers. The project received its funding from the Nazarbayev Foundation, without reliance on the national budget. ISSAI, now operating as a private organization, plans to seek further scientific grants to continue enhancing these advanced systems.
