Lale Ergin, Chief Strategy, Business Development & Innovation Officer at Borusan Holding, stated that when the foundations of innovation have been laid there has been a major cultural change within Borusan Group and internal entrepreneurship has gained a significant importance.

Ergin added that up until today internal entrepreneurship has mainly been perceived more like encouraging the employees to act like the owners of the business and behave as if they were their own bosses; however, the innovation approach has gained strength in the recent years and now certain incubation structures that are formed within the corporate companies are also considered as an example of internal entrepreneurship.

Ergin pointed out that this model has remarkably contributed the innovation strategy of the group, and added: “Thanks to the internal entrepreneurship environment created within the organization and the opportunities to work at incubation companies, the employees who have such a tendency take charge in accomplishing the new ideas which will contribute the success of their ideas or the company they are working at. Thus they both realize their skills and competencies by being subsidized by their corporation and contribute their corporation in growing and creating value through innovative business models.”

Lale Ergin reminded that innovation stood out in accordance with the vision identified by Agah Uğur, Borusan Holding CEO, 5 years ago. She mentioned that through the competencies that they have improved so far and the new & creative business models generated in the fields of activities in which Holding operates, they have managed to increase the growth rate and competitiveness. Ergin summarized the process: “30 ideas out of 100 that have been generated within this process have been reached to the project process and 6 of them have formed ‘incubation companies’. We are working on many new projects to be introduced in 2016.” Ergin told that they have focused on creative value propositions that will differentiate Borusan Holding from its competitors in terms of the business models created as a consequence of their internal entrepreneurship activities; she added they managed to reveal and solve some hidden functional problems of their customers through that approach and those studies.

Lale Ergin summarized the annual plans of Borusan Holding in terms of innovation as follows: “In 2016, we have two main priorities in the field of innovation; the first is launching the mature projects among the ones we have worked on and formulated, which means offering new brands to the markets we are operating in. The second one is strengthening the branding processes of the projects that we launched in recent years, positioning them accurately and making them grow by meeting them with our targeted consumers.”