GE Visit – 2011 TMMBA International Study Tour

The following blog was submitted by Bob Carlstrom and Brian Shaflik both from the Class of 2011.

We had the privilege to have Ibrahim Gokcen, the Market Development Manager, come and speak to us about GE Turkey.  Mr. Gokcen has a background in computer science and holds his PhD from Tulane University in Louisiana. He started to work for GE in New York as a computer scientist then transferred to Turkey to become the Market Development Manager.

 Mr. Gokcen began his presentation talking about GE as a whole and what markets it currently plays in. This primarily includes finance, energy, aircraft engines, healthcare but also include other markets. Mr. Gokcen touched on how eco-magination and healthy-mangination (two GE coined terms), are the two primary pillars of GE’s strategy. These terms imply how GE is getting creative with their technologies within the green tech and bio tech industries. He also mentioned how GE is focused on smartgrid technologies to assist in economic development.

Key interesting facts about GE Turkey:

–          GE Turkey does about 1.6B in revenue and has about 500 employees

–          The Turkey location primarily does engine parts, healthcare (which it exports to 80 countries), transportation, and energy.

–          Turkey is key for GE because it strategically located close to Europe and Asia

–          Turkey is a critical growth market for GE because of its young population and rapidly growing economy.

–           The Turkey location is used as an economy base to serve the entire region

–          Threats to GE Turkey include sovereign debt crisis and China because of their reduced cost of labor.

–          Government relations are especially important when doing business within Turkey

Overall Mr. Gokcen did a fantastic job presenting GE as a company and explaining the uniqueness’s with the GE Turkey branch and doing business in Turkey.