Uzbekistan proposes joint Central Asia-Azerbaijan IT hub

Uzbekistan has called on Azerbaijan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan to strengthen cooperation and position Central Asia as a unified IT hub.

The proposal was made by Uzbekistan’s Minister of Digital Technologies Sherzod Shermatov during a seminar held as part of the 59th Annual Meeting of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) Board of Governors, Caliber.Az reports via local media.

He said that connectivity requires deeper regional integration and highlighted ongoing efforts to harmonize telecommunications policies.

“We aim at integration through expanding telecom networks with all neighbours. In Uzbekistan, regional communication commissions are currently operating, where we are working on harmonizing frequency usage,” he noted.

According to him, this approach improves resource allocation for telecom networks and reduces cross-border interference, ensuring mobile networks do not disrupt each other near border areas.

Shermatov stressed that Uzbekistan is focusing on promoting Central Asia as a single digital space rather than separate national markets.

The minister pointed to recent high-level engagement, including a visit by Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to Bukhara, where both leaders attended a national AI hackathon, as an example of this regional approach.

“We invite Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan and other countries to work together so that we can jointly present regional products in Silicon Valley and at major global platforms such as the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. We see strong synergy here: Kazakhstan has a developed venture and financial sector, while Uzbekistan has a large youth population oriented toward startups. By combining efforts, we can achieve much more,” he added.

By Jeyhun Aghazada