Described as “tough and unpretentious,” Guler Sabanci placed 9th on The Financial Times’ yearly list of the Top 25 Business Women of Europe.Güler Sabancı (1955) is a female member of the renowned Sabancı family in third generation, and currently the chairperson of the family controlled Sabancı Holding, the second biggest industrial and financial conglomerate of Turkey. Source: Wikipedia.org
Sabanci, who was on the list last year as well, was described by the daily as the first woman to lead a huge Turkish company. After beginning work at her family’s tire factory in Izmit 28 years ago, she now presides over Turkey’s second-biggest business conglomerate, Sabanci Holdings.
The company plans to invest $3bn in power stations and electricity distribution systems, raising Sabanci’s share of electricity produced in Turkey from two percent to 10 percent over the next five years.
The newspaper also wrote that Sabanci is confident that Turkey is starting a new era of economic growth and she can see plenty of opportunities ahead.
She also says her company must lead the way in the energy sector. She is keenly aware of how much her company’s future hinges on Turkey’s progress in joining the European Union. She recently told The Financial Times that Turkey was “on track” to do so in about 10 years.
In a recent speech to students at Sabanci University, where she is chairman of the board of trustees, she encouraged them to “think critically and independently”, and be “self-assured, self-aware and purpose-oriented.”
Guler Sabanci is #65 at Forbes 100 Most Powerful Women :
Turkey's most powerful businesswoman, Sabanci took over as board chairman of the Sabanci conglomerate in May 2004 after the death of chairman Sakip Sabanci, her uncle, who made it clear he wanted neither of his two brothers nor any of their numerous male offspring to succeed him as head. Instead, he chose his niece. Sabanci, a reformed chain smoker, is a strong advocate of Turkey joining the EU. Formerly head of the group's tire production division, which she joined in 1978, Sabanci also looks after Sabanci University, which the family established in the mid-1990s on the outskirts of Istanbul, and runs a private vineyard with an uncle under the Tracia brand. She is planning to spend around $3 billion over the next five years to build new power stations and electricity distribution systems to help feed the country's expanding needs.
Source article at Forbes.com
Article about Guler Sabanci at economist.com :
TURKISH industry is dominated by two vast family businesses, both of which have recently handed over their top jobs to a new generation of 40-somethings. The Europeanised Koc group passed the reins to Mustafa Koc, the eldest of the chairman's three sons, in 2003. But before Sakip Sabanci died last year, he let it be known that he wanted neither of his two brothers nor any of their numerous male offspring to succeed him as head of the far more traditional Sabanci family business. Rather, he chose his niece, Guler. It was a choice that he had been hinting at for at least a decade.
Read the full article at economist.com
