Survive →
Grow →
Evolve.
I build the institutions and companies through which Central Asia enters the global creative and AI economy — policy, education, games, venture capital.
- Co-Founder · Creata Group
- Founder · Creata Ventures (AIFC)
- President & Co-Founder · CIAQ
- Founder · TransforNATION
02 · Transformation System
Six scales. One logic.
Policy-makers, investors, and innovators work at different scales and stop hearing each other. I hold a vision at every level — from one person to humanity — and operate across all of them at once: not as a consultant to each, but as the operator of a nested system where each smaller scale powers the larger one.
Scale 1/6
Person
Transformation starts with one person's thinking, not with institutions. Five disciplines: systems, critical, analytical, creative, philosophical. A person who thinks this way stops waiting for change and starts designing it.
the unit of transformation — where Survive → Grow → Evolve runs first
Scale 2/6
Team
Thinking scales through the people beside you. A team is the first circuit where practice becomes culture: a shared language of decisions, distributed leadership, institutions that grow without me at the centre.
leaders run each institution in their own name
Each level is run by its own leaders — the institutions grow without me at the centre: CIAQ team · Creata Ventures board
Scale 3/6 Narrative TransforNATION Samsung Solve for Tomorrow: 6 seasons, 11,450 participants Policy CIAQ 38 members · 9 committees Capital Creata Ventures AIFC jurisdiction Execution Neurostorm 55+ projects since 2019
Organisation
An organisation is thinking cast into structure. Four institutions run as one loop — narrative, policy, capital, execution — and each layer feeds the next.
The four layers are the method. The vehicle is Creata Group — an international group of companies I co-founded with partners: a venture studio and fund, an education platform, a game publisher, AI products. The alliance and the lab stay independent institutions; the group is what makes the loop investable.
Scale 4/6
City
A city is where thinking becomes an economy: creative clusters, smart infrastructure, a density of talent. This is the scale where you see whether the system works beyond a single organisation.
smart cities · creative clusters
Scale 5/6
Country
A country is the scale where the rules get rewritten: a national creative economy, whole industries, education standards. Kazakhstan and Central Asia are my proving ground and my evidence.
Kazakhstan · Central Asia
Scale 6/6
Humanity
The 25-year horizon: a model proven on a frontier market transfers to any other. Upgraded thinking — from one person to tens of billions — is what transforming humanity means.
frontier model → global
Projects at this level
TransforNATION OS The operating system that moves societies along Survive → Grow → Evolve. /os/ Humanity Strategy A framework for focusing humanity's limited resources to move through the Survive → Grow → Evolve arc. Essay — coming soon.
person → team → organisation → city → country → humanity · one pattern: Survive → Grow → Evolve
03 · Evidence
Evidence
16+years building institutions
12,000+leaders trained
55+transformation projects (Neurostorm)
36social impact projects
Institutions by system function
Narrative
TransforNATION — Founder · 2019 · Active (impact platform)
Policy
CIAQ — President & Co-Founder · 2023 · Active (38 members, National Strategy 2030)
Capital
Creata Ventures (AIFC) — Founder · 2025 · Active (startup portfolio)
Execution
Neurostorm LLP — Founder & CEO · 2019 · Active (12,000+ leaders trained, 55+ projects)
Sunny World Foundation — Co-Founder · 2015 · Active (Kazakhstan's first free Down syndrome rehabilitation centre)
ISACA Kazakhstan Chapter — Founding member · 2016 · Active (first ISACA chapter in Kazakhstan)
DAMA Astana Chapter — Founding member · 2016 · Active (first DAMA chapter in CIS)
QazCloud — Lead architect of the joint venture (Samruk-Kazyna × Kazakhtelecom), later Chairman of the Supervisory Board · 2017 · Active (sovereign cloud infrastructure)
Samruk-Kazyna Business Service LLP — Director · 2017 · Active (~100 specialists, group-wide transformation services)
Corporate track
- ex-CBTO · Al Safi Bank — Islamic neo-bank launch
- ex-CBTO · CITIX — smart-city scale-up
- ex-CBTO · Korkem Telecom — Sergek transformation
- ex-Director · Samruk-Kazyna Business Service (~100 specialists)
- ex-Deputy Group CIO · Samruk-Kazyna
Written IP
- Reference model: IT governance (Samruk-Kazyna group)
- Reference model: data governance
- Reference model: information security management
- 2 IEEE publications (Smart Ticketing, Smart City Assessment)
«Unlocking Kazakhstan's Creative Economy: Investment Challenges and Opportunities.»— The Astana Times, December 2024
«David is creating not just content — he creates narratives that become the cultural code of organizations.»— DKNews, 50 Leaders of the New Formation, 2020
04 · Writing August 5, 2026 All writing →
Ideas in writing
Creata Group: what we've been building, and where we're heading
August 2026. What got done across five tracks — policy and institutions, GameDev, education, impact, investment — and what's coming this autumn.
Read the essay → Four working theses · revised September 2026
Sixteen years of operational work, two IEEE publications, and years of public talks have converged on four working theses about how emerging markets actually modernise. These are not conclusions; they are operating doctrines under continuous revision.
The Sovereign Digital Architecture
Digital transformation of state-owned sectors fails when it automates broken processes faster. Sovereign IT modernisation requires three architectural primitives before any platform deploys: (a) governance reference models that survive ministerial turnover, (b) cybersecurity as a load-bearing function not a compliance afterthought, (c) data architecture treated as critical infrastructure on par with energy and transit. Tested across national sectors at Samruk-Kazyna; codified in three national reference models.
working thesisThe Informal-to-Formal Creative Transition
Creative economies in emerging markets are structurally informal: a large share of production sits outside tax codes, classification systems, and capital markets. Formalisation cannot be imposed by regulation alone; it requires the simultaneous deployment of (a) statistical classification (OKED codes), (b) sector-specific legal frameworks, (c) capital allocation mechanisms aligned with the new classifications, and (d) creator-facing infrastructure (hubs, accelerators, distribution platforms). The transition is multi-year and irreversible only if all four layers move together. Tested through CIAQ's work on Kazakhstan's National Creative Industries Strategy 2030.
working thesisAsymmetric Venture Capital in Frontier Markets
The Silicon Valley venture model assumes legal, talent, and capital infrastructure that frontier markets do not yet have. An institutional co-founder model — where the studio embeds operating capacity alongside founders for 18–24 months — outperforms passive capital allocation when the surrounding infrastructure is itself under construction. The studio's role is not picking winners; it is building the conditions under which winners become possible. Tested through Creata Ventures' portfolio in Creative Industries and DeepTech, structured under AIFC (Astana International Financial Centre) jurisdiction.
working thesisInclusion as Load-Bearing Architecture
Inclusion in social and economic systems is most often treated as a moral or ESG concern — a soft layer added after the core architecture is set. Field experience suggests the opposite: inclusion functions as a non-negotiable design constraint that determines whether the architecture stands at all. Systems designed without inclusion at the foundation become fragile over time; systems with inclusion as a load-bearing wall grow more resilient. Tested through Sunny World Foundation (Kazakhstan’s first free Down syndrome rehabilitation centre, 2015) and through TransforNATION’s social impact work in disadvantaged communities.
working thesisTransforNATION OS · RAV
Realize → Activate → Validate
An operating system for transformation at scale: turn vision into a concrete project (Realize), run it in a live environment with real users and partners (Activate), then check the result against metrics, not impressions (Validate). One cycle, applicable to a startup and to a government programme alike.
05 · Now 01 02 03
What I'm building now
Three concrete priorities. Updated quarterly.
Creata Ventures — the institutional stage
Moving the venture studio into a fund structure under AIFC jurisdiction: portfolio, management team, investment process. Amounts and investor composition are not disclosed publicly.
Creata Academy — open beta
The group's education platform is live in beta: a ladder from schoolchild to founder, with an in-house factory for learning content.
Creata Games — the publisher
An indie games studio and publisher: first titles, a talent funnel, and industry partnerships.
Updated September 2026 · refreshed quarterly
All projects → 06 · Contact
Looking for those who build at the intersection of policy, capital and creative culture.
Partners, investors, institutional leaders — if you are building something serious, let's talk about where our systems intersect.
- Institutions & partners Press kit and speaking topics →
- Investors & LPs Request the Creata Ventures overview →
- Government & public sector Request a CIAQ brief or a Neurostorm proposal →
- Founders & media Write on Telegram →