Başak Akdaş

Başak Akdaş Can graduated from Istanbul Technical University’s Chemical Engineering Department in 2014 and took part in various research projects during her master’s studies at Boğaziçi University between 2014 and 2016. From 2016 to 2018, she joined the founding team of the innovation department at Kastamonu Entegre, where she played a pioneering role in designing and implementing the corporate innovation system. The intrapreneurship programme she helped manage and internally mentored, along with other corporate innovation initiatives, received back-to-back awards in the Innovation Strategy and Innovation Culture categories at InovaLIG, proving the success of these efforts.

Active in the innovation ecosystem since 2016, Başak Akdaş Can has led strategic projects at Eczacıbaşı Consumer Products, including the establishment of the innovation department and R&D centre, the design of the innovation management system and the digitalisation of product lifecycle processes. At Albert Solino Management Consulting, she headed a team that delivered innovation solutions to more than 60 companies across over 20 different sectors.

Supported by an Eczacıbaşı Holding Digital Transformation Coordination scholarship, she completed executive training in innovation, entrepreneurship and strategic leadership at the University of Illinois. She is also a first-cohort graduate of the Xnovate Fellows Innovation Leadership Fellowship Programme organised by the Technology Development Foundation of Türkiye. In addition, she received training in digital product management in Berlin and further developed her skills by joining Zalando’s mentoring programme.

Today, she contributes to the innovation ecosystem as a member of the founding team of Future Innovation Leaders, which also runs a fellowship programme that brings together the innovation leaders of tomorrow. She serves as Intrapreneurship Coordinator at Binovate and provides voluntary mentoring to many university students and young professionals at the start of their careers.