Turkish companies should make sure that they jump into this bandwagon of this new automotive world and this is exactly what is going on in Turkish automotive industry these days. I am really excited to witness all these changes in the automotive world but even more excited to see how Turkish companies are working so hard to adapt.
Turkey and EU has agreed to establish a customs union in 1995, which eliminated the customs barriers, allowing the free movement of goods. Turkish automotive industry has taken the biggest advantage of this agreement, raising the production level from around 300.000, to more than 1.600.000 vehicles today, mainly due to big investments by major OEM companies. The global Tier1 companies followed the OEMs and with the addition of the local suppliers, the growth of the automotive supply industry, even, surpassed that of the OEMs during this period. In this context, today, Turkey is one of the major automotive production hubs in the world – in terms of both vehicle manufacturers and the suppliers – and still has siginificant room for further growth. Due to developments in e-mobility, connectivity, autonomous driving, we are in an era of transformation in the automotive industry. The business models, the priorities of the customers, the regulations of the governments etc, a lot of parameters are subject to change and I think this is posing important opportunities for the dynamic and versatile Turkish entrepreneurs. Today we are discussing that high tech companies could be serious players in tomorrow’s automotive world, so we all have to navigate in such unchartered waters. Turkish companies should make sure that they jump into this bandwagon of this new automotive world and this is exactly what is going on in Turkish automotive industry these days. I am really excited to witness all these changes in the automotive world but even more excited to see how Turkish companies are working so hard to adapt.