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Dogan GunesThe company name is only visible to registered members.Nortel Netaş president Müjdat Altay: Turkey can become telecom hub.
Dear TBC members hello again.
C. Müjdat Altay, president of İstanbul-based Nortel Netaş Telecommunication Co., told Let’s Talk Business that Turkey could become a strategic hub in the region’s telecommunication infrastructure. He also explained how the company has diversified its market portfolio and minimized risk exposure during the crisis. Altay said Nortel Netaş will grow by bringing the latest technological developments to the Turkish market, such as cutting-edge VoIP, multimedia, fiber optic, and next-generation wired and wireless solutions.
“We have already drawn up our contingency plans and prepared to manage the crisis,” Altay said. “Nortel Netaş serves different sectors ranging from big clients, like Türk Telekom, mobile carriers and defense establishments, to small and medium-size enterprises.” The company posted $115.8 million in total sales in 2007. Its results for the third quarter of 2008 -- the most recent publicly available figures -- totaled $98.9 million. “This shows our total turnover for the last year will easily exceed the 2007 figure,” Altay said.
The company also expects to keep its lead in exporting software products in Turkey; those sales had reached $52.8 million as of the third quarter in 2008. Employing more than 1,000 engineers, Nortel Netaş commands one of the largest R&D departments in the country, certainly the biggest in the communication sector. “We do not apply for patents for our software solutions, which at times run over 50 million lines of programming language,” he said, adding that the company does not want to reveal commercial secrets and coding in its applications. The strategy is in line with major software companies that shy away from filing patents most of the time to keep its coding secret.
It is no surprise that Nortel Netaş’s top man feels passionate about R&D as he is an engineer by education and has invested 33 years of his career in the company. “I think Turkey has caught an important opportunity at this juncture to turn itself a nation with a significant lead in R&D,” he said. He mentioned that conditions for R&D are ripe and that Turkey has all it needs to become an important player in the world’s scientific and technological advancement.
“You simply can’t succeed in trying to move the country into the top 10 economies of the world if you do not invest in R&D,” he said. Altay believes Turkey has a qualified and talented pool of young engineers to support this strategy.
“If you look at the number of students who compete on university entrance exams every year, you would see the top 10,000 students out of 1.2 million applicants choose engineering as their major,” he said, adding that “the case in Europe and the US is not the same.”
Altay also pointed out that the aging population in the West created an advantage for the Turkish economy. “What Turkey can do is create businesses that serve the needs of other countries, especially European clients,” he noted. “What is more, you do not need to move people to other countries because of the rapid development in the fields of technology and communication. You can easily provide services to international clients right here in Turkey.”
In fact, Nortel Netaş seems to have done just that. Seeing an opportunity in the new government plan to support R&D and provide incentives for the long run in 2004, the company decided to expand its R&D staff from 200 to more than 1,000. “We are expecting to grow into a team of 1,500 engineers by 2011 provided that market conditions justify such an expansion,” Altay said.
Turkey:Technology-producing country
Altay strongly believes that Turkey needs to be a technology-producing country rather than a transferring one. “Otherwise you always stay one step behind your competitors,” he stressed. He also said Nortel Netaş has contributed a great deal to Turkey’s technological development and will continue to do so. “We have created a synergy in our workforce here, and sometimes our engineers stay late at night to continue their work even though nobody asked them to do so,” he added. As he climbed the corporate ladder from an entry level position as an engineer to become the top man, he knows almost everyone in management on a first-name basis and is familiar with operations in every department.
Altay calls his young workforce “global engineers” and describes them as “very dedicated.” “The company no longer places job ads asking for experienced engineers,” he said. “Where else will they get the experience they need?” He also stressed that Nortel Netaş needs fresh minds that can think outside the box and be creative. The company provides training for its new hires and runs a master’s program with the İstanbul-based Yeditepe University to attract young graduates. “We provided 13,000 hours of training last year,” he said, stressing that education is key.
The Nortel Netaş president also believes Turkey can be a major hub in telecommunication in its region. “The infrastructure is much better compared with that of its neighbors,” he said. “We also have the technology and manpower to accomplish it.” Just as Turkey is a natural gas and energy corridor between East and West, it can also be a corridor that links the world’s communications, he noted.
Stressing that Turkey’s location is crucial, Altay said that “the only place that makes sense in laying out fiber lines between Asia/Middle East and the Europe/Mediterranean basin is Turkey.” He pointed out that current bandwidth can’t fully accommodate satellite technology and that fiber optic lines are necessary to expand communication and provide better performance.
Altay hopes the success of Nortel Netaş will lure other technology firms to develop and invest in R&D programs in Turkey. “It seems like we finally have a long-term R&D policy in place in Turkey that transcends governments,” he said.
“Here we are producing world-class technology and can compete with many international companies.”
Source: Today's Zaman
- 13 Jan 2009, 12:31 pm
