Turkcell (NYSE:TKC) (BIST:TCELL) Turkey’s leading telecommunications and
technology company launched its App Marathon this weekend with an
intensive coding event. 153 young developers, chosen from a pool of 600
applicants, coded for 25 hours under the leadership of 42 mentors, and
are now embarking on a 6-week-long journey to develop their apps.
153 developers at Turkcell's App Marathon Coding Weekend took more than 200 selfies. More than 1600 cups of coffee and 960 slices of pizza helped them survive the intense work. (Photo: Business Wire)
With its App Marathon, Turkcell will lead 153 developers, organized in
62 teams, in their effort to develop applications that will facilitate
the lives of Turkish app users and contribute to the society in solving
social, environmental and economic issues. Under the umbrella concept of
“Improving Lives with Technology”, the teams will develop apps in 7
categories: Education, Health, Mobile Finance, Transportation, M2M,
Business World and Social Responsibility. The teams will be supported by
their mentors throughout the process and participate in a final
competition at the end of 6 weeks. Successful teams will have the
opportunity to be business partners with Turkcell and the winner of the
marathon will get a chance to visit the Silicon Valley.
Among the 153 developers are a student from Mozambique and a Turkish
resident of Canada who is working on a French-English dictionary. Two
teams consist entirely of female students who are in the first year of
their college education with the financial support of Turkcell’s
“Snowdrops” program.
The vision to create a mobile software movement in Turkey
Koray Ozturkler, Turkcell’s Chief Corporate Affairs Officer,
underlined Turkcell’s commitment to solving problems through technology
and building an ecosystem around this ideal. “We have launched the App
Marathon with the vision to create a mobile software movement in Turkey,
and to encourage youth to achieve their potential. The enthusiasm and
passion that I have witnessed during the marathon proves that Turkey can
indeed be one of the leading countries in the mobile app market in the
coming years.” said Ozturkler in his address to the participants
of the coding weekend.
Turkcell’s App Marathon is part of “Developers for the Future”. Launched
in September 2013, the project aims to improve technological literacy
and the software development landscape in Turkey. The community already
boasts 15 thousand members who receive free online training in mobile
software development for iOS, Android and Windows Phone. Turkish
speakers can access the project website and become members at https://gelecegiyazanlar.turkcell.com.tr/.
ABOUT TURKCELL: Turkcell is the leading communications and
technology company in Turkey, with 35.2 million subscribers as of
December 31, 2013. Turkcell is a leading regional player, with market
leadership in five of the nine countries in which it operates with its
approximately 71.3 million subscribers as of December 31, 2013. It has
become one of the first among the global operators to have implemented
HSPA+. It has achieved up to 43.2 Mbps speed using the Dual Carrier
technology, and is continuously working to provide the latest technology
to its customers. Turkcell Superonline, a wholly owned subsidiary of
Turkcell, is the first telecom operator to offer households fiber
broadband connection at speeds of up to 1,000 Mbps in Turkey. As of
December 2013, Turkcell’s population coverage is at 99.49% in 2G and
86.17% in 3G. Turkcell reported a TRY11.4 billion (US$6.0
billion) revenue with total assets of TRY21.3 billion (US$10.0 billion)
as of December 31, 2013. It has been listed on the NYSE and the ISE
since July 2000, and is the only NYSE-listed company in Turkey. Read
more at www.turkcell.com.tr
You can now follow the most up-to-date Turkcell developments on twitter
by clicking on the link below.
http://twitter.com/TurkcellNews
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