CIS Awards

Applications OpenEdition 2026

CIS Tech Awards

The CIS Tech Awards is the independent platform for recognising technology leadership, software engineering excellence and product innovation across the Commonwealth of Independent States. In a region where the technology sector has grown from a cost-arbitrage outsourcing destination into a source of globally competitive products, the CIS Tech Awards documents and celebrates the shift — and the teams making it happen.

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Winners to date

Expert jurors

Award stages

From open submission to public results announcement — every stage has a defined start and close date.

1Active now
Applications Open
1 Mar — 31 May
2
Applications Close
1 Jun — 1 Jun
3
Jury Review
2 Jun — 31 Jul
4
Winners Announced
15 Sept — 15 Sept

— About the award

Why this award matters

Kazakhstan has emerged as Central Asia's technology hub, with Astana Hub attracting over 100 technology companies and the country investing heavily in digital infrastructure. Russia's technology sector, despite geopolitical headwinds, continues to produce world-class engineering talent and ambitious product companies. Ukraine has long been recognised as one of Europe's top engineering destinations, with companies like MacPaw, Reface and Grammarly built for global markets from Kyiv. Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan are rapidly building technology economies with strong government backing.

The awards cover the full breadth of enterprise and consumer technology: software development, artificial intelligence and machine learning, cybersecurity, cloud infrastructure, product management and technology entrepreneurship. Winning a CIS Tech Award signals to investors, enterprise buyers and international partners that a company or individual has been independently assessed against the region's highest standards.

— Who should enter

Who should enter

The award is built for professionals ready to present their work to an independent jury in a format the CIS market can judge clearly and fairly.

Digital and marketing leaders

CMOs, digital directors, heads of growth and brand managers who run campaigns and digital strategies at scale.

Agencies and delivery teams

Full-cycle agencies, specialist boutiques and in-house teams that can demonstrate measurable campaign outcomes.

Product and technology teams

Product managers, UX/UI designers and technology teams whose work has a measurable impact on user outcomes and business KPIs.

— What recognition gives you

What recognition gives you

A CIS award is not a badge. It is a public record of independent expert validation — and the market acts on that signal.

Regional market credibility

Winners appear in a public, indexable record of quality. Enterprise buyers, media partners and investors in the CIS region use the platform as a shortlist reference.

Tangible business outcomes

Winning an award has measurable impact on trust signals: website conversion uplift, inbound partnership enquiries and procurement shortlisting.

Talent and hiring signal

Teams use award recognition in employer branding, hiring pipelines and international expansion conversations.

Independent validation

Unlike internal nominations or paid placements, CIS Awards evaluation is done by an independent jury of regional senior practitioners — not by the award organiser.

— How submissions are evaluated

How submissions are evaluated

The jury evaluates every entry against transparent criteria. There is no self-nomination, no commercial bias and no predetermined outcome.

Result over assertion

Submissions are assessed on measurable outcomes: campaign data, revenue impact, user metrics and business KPIs. Judges look for evidence, not claims.

Context over scale

A well-executed campaign for a local market is evaluated alongside global-scale work. Context matters: judges are briefed on the CIS market conditions at the time.

Quality over budget

Spending more does not score higher. The evaluation framework rewards strategic thinking, creative execution and measurable efficiency — not the size of the media buy.

Independence over commercial visibility

Commercial relationships with the award organiser do not influence scoring. Jury members with conflicts of interest are recused from relevant categories.

Jury deliberations are confidential. Individual scores are not published. The outcome reflects collective professional consensus.

— What makes a strong submission

What makes a strong submission

CIS Tech Awards

Lead with the result

Start with the business outcome: revenue impact, efficiency gain, user growth or measurable brand metric. Judges read hundreds of entries — lead with what matters.

Show the context

Describe the challenge, the market conditions and the constraints. A great result without context is impossible to evaluate fairly.

Document the methodology

Include your measurement framework, attribution logic and the data sources used. Judges want to understand how results were achieved, not just that they were achieved.

Be specific about your role

Agency entries should make clear what the agency was responsible for versus the client. Individual entries should specify the team and the decision-making context.

Generic submissions that list services or make broad brand claims without evidence will not advance to final judging. Completeness matters.

— Winners

Recent winners

Independent recognition from a regional expert jury — not a self-nominated panel, not a paid placement.

See all winners

Winners to be announced

Results for this edition are not yet published. Follow the award timeline for the announcement date.

— Jury

Meet the jury

Senior practitioners from across the CIS region — CMOs, digital directors, product leads and technology leaders who evaluate every entry independently.

See all jury members

Olga Petrenko

Managing Director

FinTech Hub Kyiv

Pioneer of fintech ecosystem in Ukraine. Advisor to 30+ startups.

Ruslan Tursunov

Head of Innovation

UzDigital Agency

Award-winning creative director with expertise in digital transformation.

— Categories

Choose your competition

Each category has a specific evaluation brief. Choose based on what your case can demonstrate, not where it fits most conveniently.

View all categories

IndividualFree

Best CTO of the Year

Award for a CTO or VP of Engineering who demonstrated exceptional technology leadership, built high-performing engineering culture and drove technological decisions that delivered measurable competitive advantage. Judged on engineering output quality, team growth and retention, technical strategy documentation and evidence of impact on business outcomes.

Agency & Team$99

Best Software Development Company

Award for a software development company whose engineering practices, delivery outcomes and client results demonstrate the highest standards of quality, scalability and reliability. Judged on technical rigour, team culture and measurable product impact. Entries should include engineering metrics: deployment frequency, lead time, change failure rate, and MTTR — the DORA framework provides the objective language here.

Product & Project$99

Best AI/ML Project

Award for an AI or machine learning project that delivered genuine business value through practical application of modern ML techniques. Judged on model performance benchmarks, data quality indicators, production reliability and measurable impact on business outcomes in CIS enterprise or consumer markets. Not all AI is equal — judges are looking for real deployment, not science fair projects.

Product & Project$99

Best Cybersecurity Product

Award for a cybersecurity product that demonstrably improved threat detection, incident response or security posture for organisations operating in the CIS. Judged on technical depth, real-world effectiveness, deployment scale and measurable risk reduction. Entries should include case studies with quantified security improvements — not just feature lists.

Agency & TeamFree

Best Tech Startup of the Year

Award for a technology startup that demonstrated rapid growth, product innovation and a viable path to scale in CIS markets. Judged on revenue or user growth trajectory, product innovation depth, team quality and defensibility of the market position. Entries from Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan are particularly encouraged — these markets are underrepresented in regional tech awards.

IndividualFree

Best Product Manager of the Year

Award for a product manager who ensured the successful launch and growth of a digital product through disciplined discovery, ruthless prioritisation and cross-functional leadership. Judged on product metrics, evidence of customer discovery process and ability to navigate organisational complexity. The best PMs in the CIS are building for uniquely challenging markets — that context matters.

Product & Project$99

Best DevOps Solution

Award for a team or organisation whose platform engineering, infrastructure automation or DevOps practices delivered measurable improvements in deployment frequency, reliability, lead time and developer productivity. Judged on DORA metrics, infrastructure cost efficiency and evidence of engineering culture improvement.

Product & Project$99

Best Data Platform & Analytics Infrastructure

Award for a data platform enabling reliable analytics workflows, faster decision-making and measurable data democratisation across the organisation. Judged on data quality standards, pipeline reliability, analytics speed and self-service capabilities. Entries should demonstrate how data infrastructure translated into business intelligence that changed decisions — not just how many dashboards were built.

CIS Tech Awards

— Ready to enter?

Ready to enter?

Choose the route that fits your situation. Each path has a different timeline and evidence requirement.

Applications close when the submission window ends — late entries are not accommodated.

Enter as a participant

Choose your category, prepare your case and submit before the deadline. Standard submission window applies.

Apply now

Join as a jury expert

Senior practitioners with active market experience are invited to apply for jury positions. Expertise, not title, is the criterion.

Apply to join jury

Not sure which route fits?

Send a brief description of your case and we will help route you to the right programme and category.

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