In June of this year, the Government of Kazakhstan, by its resolution, instructed the Samruk-Kazyna Fund to ensure that its subsidiary, Karabatan Utility Solutions LLP, conclude an EPC contract for the design, supply of equipment, construction, and commissioning of second-phase infrastructure facilities of the National Industrial Petrochemical Technopark Special Economic Zone (NIPT SEZ) at the Karabatan site in Atyrau Region. The contractor designated for the project is Integra Construction KZ LLP.

There was no competition or tender for this contract. The decision regarding the contractor was made through an administrative act rather than through a public procurement procedure involving open publication of terms and acceptance of applications from all interested companies.

Why is the contract being concluded without a tender?

Karabatan Utility Solutions (KUS) is not a government body or a first-tier national company, but an LLP within the Samruk-Kazyna group through its subsidiary Samruk-Kazyna Ondeu (formerly the United Chemical Company). Since 2014, KUS has been designated as the construction operator for production and utility infrastructure of the NIPT SEZ, and in 2018 it was transferred into trust management under Samruk-Kazyna Construction JSC.

The Government of Kazakhstan is the sole founder and shareholder of the Samruk-Kazyna Fund. Article 7, paragraph 4, of the Law on the National Welfare Fund allows the government, as the sole shareholder of the fund, to make decisions on key issues concerning the activities of companies within the group, including those in which the fund is the sole or controlling shareholder. It was this provision, along with the fund’s charter, that the government cited when issuing the resolution.

Procurement by the Samruk-Kazyna Fund and its affiliated organizations is regulated by a separate set of rules approved by the fund’s board of directors in coordination with relevant state authorities, rather than by the general Public Procurement Law or the law governing procurement by quasi-state entities that applies to most other national companies. This regulatory distinction has repeatedly raised concerns among businesses and legal experts.

In 2022, Kazakh lawyer Anton Shin appealed to the antimonopoly agency to examine the practice of so-called intra-holding cooperation within Samruk-Kazyna, under which companies within the group purchase goods and services from one another without open tenders or public disclosure of procurement terms. Bolat Zhamishev, a member of the Public Council under the fund, acknowledged the validity of the concern at the time and stated that he had discussed ending the practice with the fund’s management. In 2026, Sergey Agafonov, head of the Kazakhstan Association of Energy Repair, Design, and Engineering Companies, described cases in which Samruk-Kazyna allegedly bypassed domestic manufacturers in procurement processes, while canceled and reformatted tenders resulted in contracts being awarded to importers.

Who received the contract?

Integra Construction KZ LLP is a construction company established in 1997. The company was created on the basis of a structure that had been part of the railway carrier Kazakhstan Temir Zholy and was originally known as “Remput,” later renamed “Zhol Zhondeushi.”

According to an investigation by Radio Azattyq, after privatization the company passed into private ownership through a tender process and became controlled by businessmen Alexander Mashkevich, Patokh Shodiev, and Alijan Ibragimov. According to documents cited by the media, the asset was transferred in 2012 to Orifjan Shadiev, a nephew of Patokh Shodiev, who owned the company together with Sadyr Makhmutov through the entity PRIME System KZ and subsequently rebranded it as Integra Construction KZ.

Shakhmurat Mutalip, who had previously spent nearly fifteen years as a manager—from mechanic at BENT to vice president, then adviser at the Kazakhselmash company and independent director at IST Group—became CEO of Integra Construction KZ in 2020 and chairman of its supervisory board in 2021.

During the same period, former owner Orifjan Shadiev encountered financial difficulties. Capital Bank, which belonged to him, was accused of failing to repay 20 billion tenge in state financial assistance. The National Bank revoked the bank’s license and filed a lawsuit. According to court materials from 2023, in April 2021 Integra Construction KZ was transferred to Altynstroy Corporation because of a debt of 5.2 billion tenge, and in September 2022, 99.9% of the company was sold to Management&Construction Ltd, an entity established only a few months before the transaction. The sole owner of that organization, as well as the holder of the remaining share, was Shakhmurat Mutalip.

Representatives of the National Bank argued in court that the transactions were fictitious and intended to transfer the asset to a person affiliated with Shadiev in order to avoid debt obligations to the state. A court in Astana initially upheld the National Bank’s claim, but in August 2024 the Supreme Court overturned the decision after Shadiev repaid the debt and the National Bank withdrew the lawsuit. As a result, Mutalip, who had entered the company as a hired manager, ultimately remained its owner.

Today, Integra Construction KZ is rapidly expanding its operations and regularly receives major state and quasi-state contracts, including:

• Construction of a power plant in Ekibastuz valued at more than 3 trillion tenge (through the GCL & Integra Energy consortium with a Chinese company);
• Participation in the construction of a combined-cycle power plant in Turkestan Region;
• Contracts with Kazakhstan Temir Zholy totaling approximately 3 trillion tenge for 2024–2025;
• A bid, together with a subsidiary of BI Group, for an 84.3-billion-tenge contract covering the design and construction of utility networks and transport infrastructure in the Atyrau SEZ.

In early 2026, Bloomberg and the Financial Times reported Mutalip’s interest in acquiring a 70% stake in Kazzinc, managed by the Swiss company Glencore, in a deal reportedly valued at $3.5 billion, as well as a 40% stake in Eurasian Resources Group (ERG), valued at approximately $1.4 billion. In March, the KazTAG news agency, citing its own source, reported that Mutalip had acquired the stakes of Mashkevich and Shodiev in ERG, and on May 23 ERG itself confirmed the information.

Why does the deal raise questions among businesses?

Market participants are concerned not by a single transaction but by what they view as a recurring pattern: major infrastructure and construction contracts in the quasi-state sector are awarded to a limited circle of companies without open competitive procedures. At the same time, project costs may increase significantly during implementation.

Karabatan itself provides a concrete example. In 2023, an EPC tender for the second phase of a water treatment facility within the NIPT SEZ at the KUS site was won by a consortium involving Aspan Construction Company, a firm created through the rebranding of the Russian company Velesstroy with new shareholders. Previously, Velesstroy had been one of the largest contractors on the Tengiz Future Growth Project and had appeared in discussions related to U.S. sanctions. The value of that project was then estimated at more than 83 billion tenge.

Subsequently, Integra Construction KZ displaced Velesstroy from the Karabatan wastewater treatment project, establishing a dedicated branch office for that purpose, while the estimated value of the works reportedly increased from 87 billion to more than 500 billion tenge.

The contract covers the second phase of infrastructure development for the NIPT SEZ at the Karabatan site. It concerns production and utility infrastructure without which the petrochemical plants located in the zone cannot operate, including power and water supply systems, water treatment and wastewater treatment facilities, technical gases, and related engineering networks.

The existing 310 MW combined-cycle power plant at the site supports current industrial operations, but its capacity is insufficient for planned future projects. As a result, the construction of a 165 MW gas turbine power plant is also under consideration.

The government resolution does not disclose either the value of the new EPC contract or the exact implementation schedule. According to the document, these parameters remain subject to agreement between Karabatan Utility Solutions and Integra Construction KZ, to be concluded in accordance with applicable legislation following the issuance of the resolution.

Background on the NIPT SEZ

The National Industrial Petrochemical Technopark SEZ was established by presidential decree on December 19, 2007, in Atyrau Region and is scheduled to operate until December 31, 2032 (although in 2025 there were discussions about extending this period until 2048).

The zone covers 3,475.9 hectares and consists of three sites:

• Karabatan, where the main production infrastructure and major petrochemical plants are located;
• Tengiz, where a gas separation complex supplies feedstock for polyethylene production, providing up to 1.6 million tonnes of ethane annually;
• Technopark, intended for small and medium-sized business projects producing polyethylene terephthalate and terephthalic acid.

The zone is managed by the NIPT SEZ Management Company JSC, which is part of the Samruk-Kazyna group.

As of 2025, 18 enterprises were registered within the zone.

Financing history

Government financing for the zone’s infrastructure has been provided in stages and revised several times.

Initially, in 2014–2015, 93 billion tenge was allocated from the republican budget. These funds were distributed among four main areas:

• Construction of a gas turbine power plant (later estimated at 108.3 billion tenge, representing more than half of the total budget);
• Water treatment and purification facilities (62 billion tenge);
• Technical gas production facilities (18.3 billion tenge);
• General utility infrastructure (13.3 billion tenge).

According to the feasibility study for infrastructure development at the Karabatan and Tengiz sites, total project costs were estimated at 345 billion tenge. However, in 2023 the government announced another revision of the feasibility study due to the depreciation of the tenge, increasing the projected level of public expenditure.

In January 2026, Mazhilis deputy Aidarbek Khodzhanazarov stated that the government had allocated and spent a total of 427.5 billion tenge on infrastructure development across all special economic zones in Kazakhstan. However, average infrastructure readiness remained only 68.6%, and additional financing would be required to complete the work. Although this statistic relates to the SEZ system as a whole rather than a single zone, it illustrates a broader issue: even substantial public investment in SEZ infrastructure often does not result in full completion, delaying the launch of resident enterprises due to insufficient utility capacity and prolonged connection procedures.

The contract for Karabatan’s second-phase infrastructure forms part of Kazakhstan’s long-standing strategy to develop petrochemicals as a means of moving from exports of raw hydrocarbons toward higher value-added products. Energy, water, and engineering infrastructure are essential prerequisites for launching new industrial facilities at the site, and the use of a single EPC contractor can theoretically simplify coordination of a complex technical project while concentrating responsibility for project delivery in one company.

At the same time, the decision-making process itself—specifically, the government’s directive naming a particular contractor through a formal resolution—highlights a broader systemic issue concerning transparency in procurement within Samruk-Kazyna and Kazakhstan’s quasi-state sector as a whole.