Sabah – World’s largest software company vies to be a part of Türkiye’s high-tech education initiative, Fatih Project, and eyes opening a research and development (R&D) center in the country, Türkiye’s Minister of Science, Industry and Technology, Nihat Ergun said following a meeting with Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer in the Turkish capital, Ankara.
Speaking of the significance of the government’s billion-dollar worth project, Ergun said that the overall quality of public education in Türkiye will rise considerably as the project progresses over the years and that local IT industry will further develop as a result of international contribution.
“Türkiye’s information technology sector, including the software industry, will be one of the benefactors of this project, given the international interest expressed by some of the major names of global IT industry to the project.”
Microsoft, Google, Intel, Apple, Blackberry and many others have reportedly voiced their eagerness to participate in Fatih Project before.
“Microsoft stated their willingness to cooperate with local partners for domestic production for both hardware and software aspects of the project.”, Ergun noted, adding that establishing an R&D center in Türkiye was also seriously considered by Microsoft.
To be put into practice in all over Türkiye, the Fatih Project encompasses millions of primary education students, 600,000 classrooms and 40, 000 schools to be equipped with the latest IT technologies including tablet PCs, smart boards and other state-of-the-art devices.
Türkiye seeks local manufacturing of the tablets to be distributed to students and is open to cooperate with the tech world’s leading companies eager to take part in the project.