GITEX Ai Turkey 2026, hosted by the Presidential Investment and Finance Office and organized in strategic partnership with the Ministry of Industry and Technology, with Anadolu Agency (AA) as its global communication partner, opened its doors at Istanbul Expo Center.
Sümeyye Erdoğan Bayraktar, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Women and Democracy Foundation (KADEM), attended the session titled "Women, Leadership and Human-Oriented Innovation in the Age of Artificial Intelligence" at the event organized for the first time in Türkiye within the scope of GITEX, one of the world's leading technology and artificial intelligence event networks.
In his speech here, Bayraktar said that artificial intelligence is not only a matter of engineers, technology companies or those working in this field, but has entered every aspect of life.
Stating that it should be discussed where different segments of society stand in this transformation, Bayraktar noted that women are a very important part of this transformation.
After the panel, Bayraktar visited KADEM's stand at the event.
Evaluating the event to the journalists here, Bayraktar said that they came together to introduce KADEM's Women in Innovation Program and the finalists in the program and their projects.
On the other hand, Bayraktar stated that they, as KADEM, took part in the event to explain the sensitivities in this field and said:
"As KADEM, we have been studying and thinking about women's relationship with technology since 2020, we have been reading and studying in this field. We had two international summits in this field. In 2020, the title of our summit was 'Staying Human in the Digital Age'. Then, in 2024, we went in a more focused way and again the title of our international summit was 'Artificial Intelligence and Women'. Meanwhile, we held workshops and panels throughout all this. We are covering this issue again in our academic journal."
Bayraktar emphasized that they do not only remain on the academic or intellectual side, but also have a presence in the field.
Stating that they support the initiatives of women working using artificial intelligence and technology with the Women in Innovation Program, Bayraktar stated that they also support women in cooperatives.
"Artificial intelligence has entered every aspect of your life"
Stating that they have recently realized the Artificial Intelligence and Women Project, Bayraktar said, "So why are we doing all this? Why are we interested in these? Because the world is going to a completely different place, technology is developing at an incredible speed. Artificial intelligence has entered every aspect of your life. We can achieve many things that we could not do before, with much smaller groups, in much faster times. This is especially the case for startups." he said.
Bayraktar continued his words as follows:
"So where does the woman stand here? We know that how artificial intelligence is shaped, how it is trained, how we transfer real-world experience to it, the results it will give us will depend on it. We know that men are more present in this field. We see that women cannot take part in shaping artificial intelligence sufficiently, at least for now. What is this, of course, it carries with it the risk that the same discrimination that women experience in the real world will be reflected in the digital world. Now, we see that this is more than a risk, that this is happening."
Stating that various discrimination against women continues when artificial intelligence-based systems are used in some recruitment processes, Bayraktar said, "We have seen that women receive disadvantageous results between men and women in loan applications and applications with similar profiles. Therefore, we think that it is really important to train and shape artificial intelligence-based systems in a more equitable way, that is why we are here. At the same time, we are here to support women entrepreneurs. Our friends are exhibiting their exact projects here, we are proud of them."
