Welcome speeches were delivered by Prof. Dr. Kemal Ciliz, Chairman of the Informatics Industry Association TÜBISAD representing the strongest collective voice of the companies operating in ICT and New Media sectors, and Kamal Malhotra, UNDP Representative and Coordinator in Turkey.

Prof. Soumitra Dutta, Dean of the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University and Author of Global Innovation Index, was the keynote speaker of the conference.

Tayfun Acarer, Chairman, Information and Communication Technologies Authority, and Binali Yıldırım, Minister of Transport, Maritime Affairs and Communications, made opening speeches.

The first panel “Leverage Effect of ICT on Economic Development: International Samples” was moderated by Mustafa Çağan, TÜBISAD Executive Board Member. The panelists John Higgins, General Director of Digital Europe, Kyungho Chung, Executive Vice President of Korea Internet & Security Agency and Tatiana Ershova, General Director of Institute of Information Society, shared their experience on successes and challenges of ICT4D programs implementation on the national and regional levels. Emin Sadik Aydın from the Information Society Department of Ministry of Development of Turkey made comments on the ways of the new Turkish ICT strategy realization.

The second panel “The Road to 2023, Turkey” was moderated by Turhan Menteş, Digital Turkey Platform and included interventions by Dr. Ahmet Kaplan, TÜBİTAK ULAKBİM Manager , Murteza Balcı, Deputy Undersecretary of the Prime Ministry, Associate Professor Asim Balcı, Deputy Undersecretary of MEB, and Murad Bayar, Undersecretary of Defense Industries.

The third panel “Private Sector Perspective” was moderated by Burak Aydın, Intel Turkey General Manager. The panelists were Ümit Cinali, Cisco Turkey General Manager , Hasan Süel, Vodafone External Affairs Director, Birim Gönül, Marketing Director and Member of Executive Board of the Hürrriyet Media Group, Adnan Metin, CIO of Turkish Airlines, and Özgür Tanrkulu, Partner of McKinsey Consultancy.

The fourth Panel “Success In IT, Success with IT” was moderated by author and journalist Fatos Karahasan. The panelists were Gani Müjde, author and scriptwriter, İsmet Berkan, author and journalist, Barış Özistek, CEO of Joygame, and Turgut Gürsoy, Chairman of Lidyaventures.

During the conference, Tatiana Ershova gave an interview to “Gazetem”, the Turkish-language newspaper published in Russia. She told about the Institute of the Information Society that celebrated its 15th anniversary this year, about the information society development in Russia and shared her views at the problem of trust and security in the cyberspace.