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Doğan
Taşkent

Electrical – Electrophysics Engineer, Innovation Consultant

Biography

“Incentive is like drug for the survival of a startup, issuing invoices is what entrepreneurs need. That is to say, large companies should use the products or services of that startup.”

Doğan Taşkent, member of the İndeks Speaker Agency, is one of the most eminent speakers on the topics of entrepreneurship, innovation, competition and startup ecosystem etc. He worked as R&D engineer, expert consultant and training expert during 1998-2005 at the fiber optic network systems division of Lucent Technologies Bell Laboratories (New Jersey). During this period, he undertook the installation of electro-optic network infrastructure of Verizon, BT, Telia, Deutsche Telekom, Global Crossing, Qwest and UPC in different continents. He offered consultancy services to Lucent Worldwide Services in New York on the areas of “Knowledge Management”, “Competency Management” and “Telecommunication Technologies”. Taşkent, who has been working as the company-restructuring consultant for Arkan & Ergin Kurumsal Finansman on the telecommunication, renewable energy and entrepreneurship ecosystem in Turkey since 2006, has played a major role in the birth of several business plan competitions and startup companies.

Doğan Taşkent, who gives us insight into the latest developments in entrepreneurship as a speaker at conferences, states that entrepreneurship also existed in the past but it was “incomplete”. Taşkent suggests that the six pillars of Finance, Marketing, Human Resources, Culture, Law and Support used by all companies worldwide, as described in the Babson College model, are required for the creation of a sustainable ecosystem. Taşkent states that Turkey has demonstrated rapid progress in this area with the increased amount of investments in the Internet, gaming and mobile technologies during the last five years, but he also emphasizes that more effort should go into developing biotechnology, nanotechnology and green technology products.

Who is he?

Having completed his bachelor’s degree at the Electrical Engineering School of Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich in 1993, he joined the master program of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and then won a scholarship at the Polytechnic Institute of NYU, and he began to conduct researches in the area of electrophysics, focusing in particular on the lasers. He received graduate degrees in electrophysics and technology MBA. Taşkent, the founding chairman of MIT Enterprise Forum Turkey, is also a member of the advisory board of Endeavor Turkey. Taşkent has been the Chairman of the Swiss Chamber of Commerce in Turkey since 2012 and he is the Vice President of the Turkish-Swiss Business Council of DEIK (Foreign Economic Relations Board). In addition to Turkish, he also gives presentations in English and German.

Speech Topics

  • Artificial Intelligence
  • The secret for developing technology
  • Industry 4.0; Any Good for Turkey?
  • Dissociating techonology
  • Operational efficiency; The Swiss model
  • Entrepreneur; need to be a gladiator
  • Formula for Turkish “Elon Musk”
  • You are in the heart of Mahmutpaşa, not in the Silicon Valley!
  • Technology-Life Cycle
  • Strategic Thinking Over Chess
  • Darwin, Feminism, Bazaar; catching the innovation link?