IE Eastern Europe & Central Asia Alumni Retreat.

It has been 2 years since our last regional retreat, and those who joined us un Tbilisi in 2017, surely remember how amazing the weekend was. Are you ready for the next one? 
As you all know IE Experience doesn’t end when you graduate, it continues and enhances as you become Alumni.  Our regional retreat is designed to offer you opportunities to reconnect with IE, learn something new, network and enjoy our regional community of like-minded people. And this year, you will have an opportunity to delve into the beauty of Turkey’s cultural capital - the legendary city of two continents, Istanbul.  We will be joined by local alumni, and we will have sessions with local business leaders and companies.

Join us to network, connect, learn and have fun!

Agenda

Friday, September 27, Divan Brasserie

19.00- 19.30 Guests arriving
19:30 – 20:00 Welcome word and updates from Global Alumni Relations by Julia Sanchez, Head of Global Alumni Relations at IE

20:00 - 22:00 Networking Cocktail

Saturday, September 28, Kolektif House Levent

10.30 - 11.00 Welcome coffee & speed networking

11.00 - 11.10 Welcome word and Agenda by Victoria Susakova, Director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia at IE

11.10 - 12.10 Master class Two-Wheeled Innovation by Professor Edgar Gonzalez- Director of Bachelor in Design at IE School of Architecture.

In this Design Business Case, Professor Edgar Gonzalez will explore the case of VanMoof an innovative Bicycle company based in the Netherlands with global aspirations. A killer product, a beautiful website, a revolutionary approach, and a star service get all trashed when the last link of the chain does not belong to your control and compromises the whole experience. In an interactive format, Professor will walk you through each of the competitive advantages and innovations that van Moof brought to the market, and discuss how one of the biggest problems compromise the global star.

Based in Madrid, Edgar Gonzalez leads the Bachelor in Design program at IE School of Architecture and Design. He founded EGD Edgar Gonzalez Design, a Strategic Design Agency, where he serves clients as a consultant specialised in applying design processes to complex problems. As, Editor-in-chief of edgargonzalez.com since 2002, one of the main reference websites about architecture and design in the Spanish speaking world, he is tuned in to news and trends in architecture and design throughout the world. He has served as guest professor and speaker in several universities and has been the curator and designer of several exhibitions and cultural projects. From 2000 to 2002 he worked as an architect at Zaha Hadid Architects in London and at Arquitectura Torres Nadal from 2002 to 2005. He also served as an editorial designer for the Architectural Association London, The Economist and The Guardian.

12.10 - 12.30 A brief look at Turkish M&A market by Pinar Kavukcuoglu,, Director at Pragma Corporate Finance, IMBA 2004.

Pınar will share an overview of main dynamics and trends of Turkish M&A market. Pınar Kavukcuoğlu has thirteen years of investment banking experience in Pragma Corporate Finance, the leading M&A advisory firm in Turkey with 90 completed deals since 2005 and more than US$6 bln in transaction size. Her industry experience covers food&beverage, retail, FMCG, logistics, healthcare & medical, financial services, machinery & equipment, and call center. She has worked in numerous projects working together with both Turkish and multinational companies like Danone, DuPont, ThyssenKrupp, Koç Holding, Esas Holding, Hitachi Transport Systems, Ajinomoto, HNA Group, ISS, Vienna Insurance Group, Erste Bank, and all major regional PEs. Prior to joining Pragma in 2006, she received her BS Degree in Civil Engineering from Istanbul Technical University in 2002 and IMBA Degree from IE in 2005.

12.30 - 13.30 Country presentations by alumni

• Bulgaria - Nikola Chalev, EMBA 2016
• Russia- Anzhelika Kulyashova, EMBA 2015
• Romania – Roxana Hidan, EMBA 2012
• Turkey – Pinar Kavukcuoglu, IMBA 2004
• Georgia – Teona Mikadze, IMBA 2008.  Ann Mirianashvili, MCMC 2018.
• Ukraine- Veronika Tamaio Flores, MBD 2016

13.30 - 15.30 Lunch & venue tour

Kolektif House is a coworking space that brings together creative people under the same roof. Designer furniture, green areas, themed meeting rooms, meditation room, Ko-library, winter garden and a large terrace help to get away from the hustle of the city while being at the center of Istanbul. One of the founders will make a venue tour to show us around this inspiring space and share more insights into this business.
 

15.30 - 15.50 The importance of professional diversity: skills, networks, personal branding in today’s labor market by Khalid Ahadov, Member of The Supervisory Board at International Bank of Azerbaijan.

Khalid will share the transition procedure from corporate to the public world and will present his ideas on how leadership in corporate environment is different of that in the public sector. Besides, audience will get strong insights on the advantages of being “professional generalist” today as opposed to having a specific expertise field.

Khalid Ahadov, a professional commercial banker, received MBA degree from IE Business School in 2011. After graduating from IE Business School, he undertook several positions in banking sector such as being the Vice President of Azerbaijan Banking Association, Chairman and Supervisory Board Member of International Bank of Azerbaijan, Member of the Board of Trustees at Azerbaijan Deposit Insurance Fund and Chairman of Supervisory Board at Azerbaijan Credit Bureau. Recently Khalid has made a smooth shift to public sector and currently acts as the economic adviser to the 1st Vice-President of the Republic of Azerbaijan. Khalid also holds Executive Masters in Public Administration degree from London School of Economics.
15.50 - 16.00 Coffee break 
 

16.00 - 17.00 Start-Up Pitches/Entrepreneurship track

Start-Up Pitches 

Olga Pantchenko - GMBD 2019. The features include complex user profiling and segmentation, matches with ”friends of friends” and between groups of people WIYO is a tool that injects “real life” into your network. It optimizes potential for face-to-face meetings, helping keep your network strong and energized. Location- and time based tool that helps people easily share their travel plans with their network and get notified when their paths will cross, allowing pre-planning meetups in real life.

Yury Vecher - GXMBA 2015. Tips+. People are not greedy, they are simply stopped using cash. But how to collect tips in a cashless world where banks and payment systems do not really interested in helping you? Tips+ provides standalone self-service payment terminal with a user-friendly interface that allows guests of bars and coffee shops to express their gratitude. 

Nadezhda Kopievskaia - EMBA 2019. Sportboosters. Web platform that allows in 3 clicks: to find, to book and to pay for any kind of sport event from running with sport community to personal training. Open base of trainings, trainers and sport studios that allows in few seconds to find best combination of place to train and training program for a person’s goal and budget in any part of the world.

Entrepreneurship track
 

The "Short History" of Turkish Startup Ecosystem by Ata Uzunhasan - Managing Director at Galata Business Angels Official.  Even though the word “startup” is known in Turkey only for the last decade, founding a new startup has become a dream for many Turkish youngsters. That also brought up a totally new business area: Venture Financing - Angel Investing & Venture Capital. In this presentation, Uzunhasan will be guiding the audience on the brief history of this emerging ecosystem.

Ata Uzunhasan graduated from Italian High School in Istanbul and Business Administration and Economics majors in Koc University, he began his career in PwC as an auditor in 2005. In 2007, Uzunhasan was transferred to PwC Consulting as a Senior Consultant, where he achieved significant success in Turkey's first forensic accounting team. In 2010 he joined the TEB Strategy and Business Development Department, the team that managed TEB - Fortis merger in early 2010. He also directed various transformation projects until 2014. In 2015, he directed segment management at TEB’s Retail Banking Marketing department; meanwhile, he founded and successfully managed TEB Band, which is the largest social initiative of TEB. Uzunhasan is the General Secretary of the Galata Business Angels since 2016.  He is one of the most respected figures of angel investing in Turkey.

Maxim Kondratyukin – IMBA 2009. bOombate is a Russian coupon website that offers discounts and special offers allowing to save up to 90% of the normal price. Every day, the site publishes dozens of new deals for selected cities in Russia. Users get coupons, gifts and bonuses for free, and only pay when they purchase goods or services. Since special deals last on average one month, there’s a great variety of offers at users’ disposal at any given moment. bOombate is also an infotainment resource with news, latest trends and exhaustive overviews of the products and services featured on the website.

Anna Plotkina - GXMBA 2012 

20:00 Boat cruise on the Bosphorus  To buy tickets

Sunday, September 29, Free day to enjoy the famous Bazars, river banks, and Turkish coffee.

The registration will be closed on September 5th.