Dinara Kulibayeva hands over her Kazakh-British Technical University to the state

The Kazakh-British Technical University (KBTU) has been returned to state control. The prestigious university was previously owned by the Nursultan Nazarbayev Educational Foundation (NNEF), which was established by Dinara Kulibayeva, the middle daughter of former president Nazarbayev, along with two other individuals.

As of Feb. 27, 2025, KBTU’s financial statements confirm that the university’s ownership was transferred to the Returned Asset Management Company (RAMC), a government-owned commercial entity.

Concurrently, NNEF has relinquished its shareholding in the university. Public records on the eGov.kz portal list Dinara Kulibayeva, Galina Samarskaya and Askar Nurpeisov as the three founders of the foundation.

KBTU was established in 2001 through a collaboration between the government of Kazakhstan, the British Council and the British Embassy in Kazakhstan. In 2003, Kazakhstan’s national oil and gas company KazMunayGas (KMG) became the university’s sole shareholder. Since 2018, it had been owned by NNEF.

In February 2024, the Bes.media news portal reported that the Almaty prosecutor’s office initiated legal proceedings against KMG and NNEF, aiming to overturn the 2018 sale of KBTU for 11.3 billion tenge (approximately $33 million), alleging undervaluation of the university’s shares.

KBTU’s campus is located in downtown Almaty. The building was constructed in 1957 during the Soviet era. It initially housed Kazakhstan’s Council of Ministers and later became the seat of the country’s parliament.

On March 3, media reports indicated that KBTU’s D.V. Sokolskiy Institute of Fuel, Catalysis, and Electrochemistry was transferred to RAMC.