Türkiye Artificial Intelligence Initiative (TRAI) announced the October 2026 results of the Enterprise Map study it has been carrying out since 2017. In the evaluation conducted to provide an up-to-date and reliable view of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, newly established companies were included in the map, while startups that were determined to have terminated their operations were removed from the list. Compared to 482 startups in April, there was a net increase of 22 startups, reaching a total of 504.
The founding years and locations of newly added startups also provide important clues about the development of the ecosystem. 25 of the 41 startups whose founding year is known were launched in 2025 or 2026. While Istanbul continues to be one of the important centers of new startups, startups from Ankara, Izmir, Bursa, Antalya, Samsun, Bolu and Gebze were also included in the map. Companies whose founders include Turkish entrepreneurs and whose headquarters are in New York, Dubai or Amsterdam were also included in the update.
AGENTIC AI COMES TO THE FRONT
The category with the most new startups added in the October update was Agentic AI with 10 startups. In April, 5 startups were included in this category. Agent-based solutions that can undertake end-to-end tasks in areas such as training content production, security operations, product strategy and corporate digital employees were among the clear focuses of new products. 5 each for the Conversational Artificial Intelligence and LegalTech categories; 4 initiatives were added to the HR Tech and Forecasting and Data Analytics categories.
3 each in the Smart Platforms, Infrastructure and Operations/Service categories; There were 2 new initiatives each in the HealthTech and RPA and AI Automation categories. One startup participated in each of the Image Processing, Machine Learning, Internet of Things, Autonomous Systems and Visual AI – Visual Production categories. Thus, 43 new initiatives were distributed into a total of 14 different categories.
Mobility in vertical solutions has become especially evident in legal and human resources technologies. The number of startups added to the LegalTech category increased from 2 in April to 5 in October. Solutions in this area focus on Turkish legal practices, from lawyers' case law research to analysis of risks in construction contracts. The HR Tech category, where no new initiatives were added in the April update, won 4 startups this time. Artificial intelligence-supported interviews, platforms that manage end-to-end recruitment processes, and tools that simulate critical job interviews came to the fore.
Solutions for managing artificial intelligence have also become more visible on the map. Three startups in the Infrastructure and Operations/Service category are developing governance tools that monitor GPU infrastructure as well as in-house artificial intelligence usage and costs, and make unregistered artificial intelligence use (shadow AI) visible. This picture indicates that as artificial intelligence applications become widespread, infrastructure, control and cost management are turning into a separate field of entrepreneurship.
“500 THRESHOLD IS AN IMPORTANT OPPORTUNITY”
Evaluating the results of October 2026, TRAI General Manager Can Sinemli made the following statements: "Exceeding the 500 threshold in the TRAI Enterprise Map shows the point at which Turkey's entrepreneurship accumulation in the field of artificial intelligence has reached. In addition to numerical growth, the diversification of solutions and the deepening of specialization in certain areas also draw attention. In this period, we see that agent-based systems, applications for law and human resources, and solutions focusing on artificial intelligence management come to the fore. While adding new enterprises to our map, we also remove those that have ceased operations." “We attach importance to reflecting the current view of the ecosystem. Our aim is to contribute to institutions, investors and entrepreneurs being able to follow the artificial intelligence knowledge in Turkey and evaluate cooperation opportunities.”
