Senior year students in Innovative Product Design and Development I-II GE401-402 are now selling shares for the companies they established last fall.
Four fictitious companies were created this year. Students are now working hard to establish a place in the market for their companies. All of them: Synapsis, Syntax Error, Sentinel Systems and Optimizer Machineries, were launched at the beginning of the fall term 2001 as an innovative way to fill gaps in the market.
Synapsis is developing a product called Miracle to help the visually impaired. Syntax Error's project is called On line Tunalı and will let you virtually wander or shop Tunalı or any other street. Sentinel Systems is trying to solve all your parking and traffic problems with products called Typhon and Lepton access. Last, but not least, Postmizer, by Optimizer Machineries, will decrease the waste in the leather industry, allowing them to become more competitive in world markets. At the beginning of March 2002 companies were presented to the trade market at the traders’ conference. Each company sold a large portion of its shares to the Investment Banker, Dr. Kürşat Aydoğan (Dean, Faculty of Business Administration). The remaining shares of the companies were then allocated to about 25 traders (all professors in various departments of Bilkent University) who can trade the shares once a week in a virtual stock market.
The progress of each company is under the close scrutiny of the Venture Capitalists: Dr. S. Aktürk (Industrial Engineering), Dr. K. Aydoğan (Management), Dr. M. Baray (Computer Engineering), Dr. B. Özgüç (Graphic Design), Dr. B. Özgüler, and Dr. T. Reyhan (Electrical and Electronics Engineering). These six GE-402 coordinators are extremely concerned whether the firms will make good use of the money they have invested!