From Milking Cows in Kyrgyzstan to Building a $98%-Approval Law Firm | Aizada Marat (Alma)

**Aizada Marat** (0:00)
Some traditions are wrong, and I don't accept them, and I get to choose which traditions I want to follow. I was very rebellious since I was very little. We wanted to build a big company, and we wanted to show that female founders from Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan can build a big company.

**Amrit Rao** (0:16)
Why do you think the future of immigration law will look like Alma versus what it looks like today?

**Aizada Marat** (0:23)
The answer is short. They will not be able to compete with us.

**Amrit Rao** (0:34)
Welcome to another episode of the Village Global Podcast. My name is Amrit Rao, General Partner of Village Global.
My guest today is Aizada Marat, founder and CEO of Alma, an immigration law firm that combines the expertise of seasoned attorneys with AI to streamline a complex immigration process for individuals and businesses. Alma has achieved a 98% approval rate on its cases, and it can prosecute in half the time of a traditional firm. After pivoting from selling software to law firms to selling solutions to individuals and businesses trying to hire immigrants, they've seen rapid growth and strong customer love. Today, we're going to discuss Aizada's immigrant journey to America from Kyrgyzstan, starting Alma with co-founders Asselt and Shuo, her marriage to fellow founder and villager, Chyngyz, and of course, her advice to aspiring founders everywhere. So Aizada, tell us about your journey to America.

**Aizada Marat** (1:41)
My journey to America actually started in Kyrgyzstan, obviously, where I am from.
I grew up in a very small village and rural area.
So imagine just this life where I used to actually milk cows, I could take care of the field workers. I do all of those things. I'd go to school, I was a very diligent and good student because my parents kept telling me, the only thing that will pull you out of this rural area, a village, is education. That's what they told me every day, every dinner. It was on repeat. And then I was like, yes, I'll do all of it. I'll do all of it. And then one day, well, we bought a TV, I think when it was maybe 12 or 13, we bought a TV. And then there was this sort of top chart, music top chart name.

**Amrit Rao** (2:32)
Welcome to another episode of the Village Global Podcast.

**Aizada Marat** (2:35)
My name is Amrit Rao, General Partner of Village Global. And I was so impressed.

**Amrit Rao** (2:39)
My guest today is Aizada Marat, Founder and CEO of Alma, an immigration law firm that combines the expertise of seasoned attorneys with AI to streamline the complex immigration process. Can I just start over again? Yeah, sorry.

**Aizada Marat** (2:55)
The gym, the uniforms that they were wearing, everything that was depicted in that video, I was just very, very fascinated about.

**Amrit Rao** (3:02)
Welcome to another episode of the Village Global Podcast. My name is Amrit Rao, General Partner of Village Global.

**Aizada Marat** (3:08)
And the restrooms were located outside.

**Amrit Rao** (3:11)
And we had to actually walk, and these are winters in Central Asia, which is very severe and cold winters. And I was like, I want to go to the US.

**Aizada Marat** (3:22)
I would just think of it, and I'm like, I need to go to the US.

**Amrit Rao** (3:25)
I want to go to the US.
So it was just an idea that stuck in my head. I just knew I will go to the US.

**Aizada Marat** (3:31)
And then I heard about this program, which is called Future Leaders Exchange Program, and it was done in another city.
So my sister and I, we took a bus. She's young, I'm young, we just took a bus, go to another city, and then we took a test to participate in this Future Leaders Exchange Program. This is supported by US Senate, actually. It was initiated by US Senate for former Soviet Union countries to bring high school students that are not yet subject to propaganda and to show them what US is. This is after the collapse of USSR, so they wanted to show the younger generation that US is not hostile and the main purpose is the cultural exchange. But it's also very selective. We went there and my sister and I were just very adamant about learning English. My mom, she went to local bazaar and she got us a book which was English vocabulary.
My sister and I would listen to Britney Spears songs and then later to Backstreet Boys songs, and then they would say words and then we would write them down and we would try to find in vocabulary. And trying to understand and sometimes it didn't mean anything so we got the words wrong. So it was a hard way of learning English. But then we were also lucky there was a US court volunteer from America and basically wherever I was in the city, if I saw Americans, I'd just go and talk to them. And my mom would be like, we need to go home. You were just stuck at bazaar and talking to tourists. But I was obsessed about learning English because I figured that this was my way.