Our experts

Transport and infrastructure expert with 28 years of professional experience since 1998, including more than 18 years on assignments financed by ADB, the World Bank, EBRD, ESCAP, USAID, JICA, UNDP, FAO and the Government of Kazakhstan. An independent consultant since 2009, he advises governments, international financial institutions and industry on transport policy, corridor development and investment preparation across Central Asia, the South Caucasus and the Asia-Pacific region. He currently leads the infrastructure workstream of ADB's support to Kazakhstan's critical minerals strategy.

He was team leader and lead writer of the Concept for the Development of the Transport and Logistics Potential of Kazakhstan to 2030 and team leader for the road chapters of the Nurly Zhol infrastructure programme for 2020–2025, both adopted by government decree, and led the team that prepared a draft national programme for cargo containerisation and container transport for 2025–2029. His other work covers toll roads, road sector planning, railway markets, ports and shipping, automated vehicles and energy-efficient freight. He has spent more than a decade in senior commercial and executive roles with leading rolling stock and rail systems manufacturers, served on the board of Astana's international airport (2008–2014) and has been a member of the Public Council of the Agency for Strategic Planning and Reforms since 2024.

Transport and logistics executive with more than two decades of experience in rail, road and multimodal freight in Kazakhstan and along the Europe–Caucasus–Asia corridor. He has been General Director of TRANCO PL LLP (TRANCO JSC), a logistics provider specialising in industrial rail freight, since 2021, after two years as its Deputy General Director. He is also an Independent Director of Alatau Air Cargo JSC and, since August 2025, a voting member of the Logistics and Transport Committee of the Presidium of the National Chamber of Entrepreneurs “Atameken”, representing the Association of National Freight Forwarders of Kazakhstan.

From 2013 to 2019 he was Deputy General Director and a Management Board member of KTZ Express, the multimodal logistics subsidiary of Kazakhstan Temir Zholy. In 2012–2013 he was Executive Director for Marketing and Transit at the KTZ Transport Logistics Development Centre and Acting Vice President of the National Centre for Transport Logistics Development. Earlier he worked as a trade procedures expert on the USAID Regional Trade Liberalization and Customs Project, as a tax and customs law consultant at the law firm GRATA and as head of an expert group at the TRACECA Permanent Secretariat in Baku. His project work includes the Nurly Zhol programme for 2020–2025 and the national trade and local content development programmes for 2010–2014.

Lawyer and economist with more than 25 years of experience, including economic regulation and legislative drafting for the public sector. From 1999 to 2004 he worked at the Ministry of Transport and Communications and at the Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan for Regulation of Natural Monopolies, and from 2004 in banking and other commercial organisations. He has extensive experience in drafting legal acts across a wide range of economic and legal fields.

As Managing Director of the consultancy KazInvestConsulting from 2004 to 2012, he led assignments for the natural monopolies regulator, the Ministry of Transport and Communications, the Ministry of Economy and Budget Planning, the Economic Research Institute, the Samruk state asset holding and railway companies. The work covered technical and financial reviews of regulated airports, industrial rail operators and water utilities, methodologies for regulated tariffs, draft legal and technical acts for civil aviation, including a technical regulation on aviation equipment safety, methodologies for assessing the performance of government programmes and local executive bodies, and a development strategy for Kyzylorda region to 2015.

Strategy and innovation executive with a background in transport economics and planning; about half of his career has been in transport and half in innovation management. Since 2022 he has been Chief Strategy Officer of the Samgau Center for Scientific and Technological Initiatives, part of the Samruk-Kazyna group, responsible for strategy and business development. He has a broad knowledge of Kazakhstan's transport and innovation sectors and of the related government policies.

He has worked as a consultant on transport projects financed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank and USAID, and has more than five years of part-time consulting experience on transport projects in Kazakhstan. His international education spans transport planning, business management and urban planning: he holds a master's degree in transport with business management from Imperial College London and a master's degree in city and regional planning from King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals in Saudi Arabia, and studied economics in the United States on a US Department of State exchange programme.

Transport policy specialist with more than 25 years of experience in government service and international transport cooperation. Since 2024 he has been Director of the Transport and Infrastructure Department of the Eurasian Economic Commission. From 2019 to 2024 he headed the Permanent Representation in Kazakhstan of the Permanent Secretariat of the Intergovernmental Commission TRACECA, having earlier served as TRACECA Secretary General in Baku from 2006 to 2009.

At the Ministry of Transport and Communications of Kazakhstan he headed the units for the regulation of international road transport and for transit policy, later directed the Department of Strategic Planning and Logistics, and advised the Minister. He was President of the National Center for the Development of Transport Logistics, directed the Centre for Transport Logistics Development of Kazakhstan Temir Zholy and was Managing Director of the National Chamber of Entrepreneurs, heading its logistics and transport department. He has also held posts at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, has served on the Public Council for Industry and Infrastructure Development, and holds the title of Honorary Road Transport Worker of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Finance and public policy professional with more than 20 years of experience in investment, public-private partnerships, state asset management and transport sector finance. Since 2022 he has been an executive of Smart Capital Management, a licensed asset manager in the Astana International Financial Centre, and is now its Managing Director. In 2022–2023 he was also Financing and Planning Specialist on the USAID Trade Central Asia Activity, leading the assessment of investment needs, developing a model to evaluate the performance of the transport and logistics sector and preparing the financing plan for the Concept for the Development of the Transport and Logistics Potential of Kazakhstan to 2030.

Earlier he was Deputy Chairman of the state-owned Housing Construction Guarantee Fund (2016–2020), a department director at Baiterek National Managing Holding, and Director of the State Assets Management Policy Department of the Ministry of Economy and Budget Planning, where he worked on privatisation and the People's IPO programme. He headed international cooperation at the Kazakhstan PPP Center and the Kazakhstan Industry Development Institute, and has worked as a development analyst at UNDP, an adviser to the Deputy Prime Minister and an expert at the Administration of the President. Early in his career he took part in World Bank and ADB transport sector planning projects.

Public administration and transport policy specialist with more than 15 years in government service, covering road transport, trade, local content and industrial policy. From 1999 to 2009 he served at the Ministry of Transport and Communications, heading the Road Transport Directorate from 2006 and later serving as Deputy Head of the Transport Control Inspectorate for Astana. He drafted national legislation and intergovernmental agreements, led Kazakhstan's delegations in international negotiations and worked with the UNECE Inland Transport Committee, ESCAP, TRACECA, the IRU and other international bodies.

From 2009 to 2014 he was deputy director of the departments for trade development, local content development and new technologies at the Ministry of Industry and Trade and then the Ministry of Industry and New Technologies, and in 2014–2015 Deputy Akim (deputy mayor) of Ekibastuz, responsible for the economy, budget and finance. Since 2015 he has worked with RDC, and in 2018–2019 he was Director of the Strategic Development Department of the Republican Centre for Geological Information (Kazgeoinform). He has contributed to more than 20 international agreements and to national acts and programmes, including the Law on Road Transport, the Law on State Support of Industrial and Innovative Activity and the Industrialisation Map for 2010–2014.

Rail industry professional with more than a decade of experience in locomotive manufacturing, market development and business strategy in the 1520 mm gauge countries. Since 2022 he has led special projects and railway systems key accounts at Borusan Cat Kazakhstan, covering Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan and supporting Progress Rail and Caterpillar solutions in the railway, mining and infrastructure sectors. His work combines an understanding of electric and diesel traction with commercial strategy, tender leadership and engagement with ministries, railway administrations and industrial groups.

From 2015 to 2022 he worked in marketing and business development at the Electric Locomotive Assembly Factory (EKZ) in Astana, an Alstom joint venture, covering market analysis, competitive assessment, sales forecasting, product strategy and negotiations with railway operators and industrial clients. Earlier he was a project manager in transport and logistics at Nomad Services and a marketing specialist at the Locomotive Assembly Plant (LKZ), researching the diesel locomotive market of the 1520 mm area. His expertise covers mainline and shunting locomotives, hybrid and alternative traction, localisation, mining rail operations and market intelligence.