The Road to Battlefield competition, organised by Silkroad Innovation Hub in partnership with TechCrunch, Freedom Holding, Astana Hub, and IT Park Uzbekistan, is now in its second year. The competition aims to provide founders across Central Eurasia a direct route to TechCrunch Startup Battlefield 200 at Disrupt, scheduled for October 13-15 in San Francisco.
This year, the competition received 726 applications from 39 countries, marking a nearly 50% increase in submissions and a dozen more countries than in 2025. Of these applicants, 609, or approximately 84%, are developing AI products, indicating a rapid adoption of the technology among founders in the region.
National rounds for Road to Battlefield 2026 took place online from July 6 to 20, resulting in 22 startups advancing to a regional final on August 12. From this regional final, three finalists will be selected to represent the region at TechCrunch Startup Battlefield 200. Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan each have six startups in the regional final, suggesting they are the region's largest startup ecosystems.
The competition also includes an investment prize pool of $100,000, funded by Astana Hub Ventures, IT Park Ventures, and Silkroad Innovation Hub, to be split among the top three finalists. Additionally, the top three winners will receive up to $100,000 in OpenAI API credits, while the remaining 22 finalists will each receive $10,000 in OpenAI API credits.