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Türkiye launched its most ambitious technology festival Wednesday, with organizers positioning the event as a cornerstone of the country's drive toward technological independence and global influence.
TEKNOFEST 2025 opened in Istanbul under the banner of the "Turkish National Technology Move," drawing a record 1.1 million competition applicants to what organizers call the world's largest technology festival. The five-day event features 64 competitions, including 13 new categories, according to Selcuk Bayraktar, head of TEKNOFEST and chairman of the Turkish Technology Team Foundation.
"At TEKNOFEST, we don't just see brilliant ideas and new inventions. We also see the skilled hands and minds that turn those ideas into steel, code, and products," Bayraktar said during the opening ceremony. "We see tens of thousands of young people who will produce these technologies in factories and develop them in workshops tomorrow."
The festival represents Türkiye's broader ambition to achieve technological self-sufficiency across sectors ranging from healthcare to agriculture, transportation, and communications. Bayraktar emphasized that "the sole purpose of the Turkish National Technology Move is achieving a fully independent, prosperous Türkiye."
Central to Türkiye's tech independence strategy are two new digital initiatives unveiled at the festival. NSosyal, a Turkish social media platform, positions itself as an alternative to global tech giants, while the Kure Digital Encyclopedia aims to provide an AI-powered, open-source knowledge base.
"NSosyal is a protest against global digital monopolization," Bayraktar explained. "NSosyal is where respect, face-to-face politeness, and freedom of expression meet in our digital world."
The Kure project, developed over 1.5 years by the T3 Foundation and KUME Foundation, promises to be "a living source of knowledge that you will write and discuss" with transparent authorship for all content. Bayraktar described it as "the channel of truth against disinformation and manipulation."
Bayraktar connected Türkiye's technological ambitions to broader moral concerns, particularly regarding the conflict in Gaza. He described ongoing violence there as "the most ruthless genocide of the modern era," stating: "Babies, children, innocent people are being slaughtered in Gaza. If killing babies is considered legitimate in a place, then there are no longer any moral or legal boundaries there."
The TEKNOFEST leader framed technological advancement as essential for moral leadership, arguing that "the National Technology Move is not just about making faster rockets and smarter systems." Instead, he said, "Our cause is to combine technology with conscience and reason with morality."
"Our cause is to achieve the deterrent power that will say 'stop' to this oppression," Bayraktar added. "This power is to ensure moral superiority alongside military, economic, and technological superiority."
TEKNOFEST 2025 is organized by the Turkish Technology Team Foundation and Türkiye's Industry and Technology Ministry, with Anadolu Agency serving as the global communications partner. The festival runs through the weekend in Istanbul.
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