Miller Magazine Issue 137 May 2021

77 TECHNOLOGY PLATFORM MILLER / may 2021 it reduces the carbon emissions and saves water and en- ergy. It protects both the environment and human health as it enables production with zero waste. To give an exam- ple, while the waste water discharged by the facilities that use chemicals to bleach the denim poisons the nature, the waste water of the facilities that do the same job with enzymes makes a good home for the fish. In other words, it is a green technology which is absolutely sustainable and environmentally friendly. Currently, there are some large-scale companies around the world, which operate in the field of biotechnology. Our goal as LIVZYM is to contribute to the widespread use of enzymes in the industrial field by growing the market in our geography with a local language, as the first biotechnologi- cal enterprise in the enzyme field. With the essential capacity boost and infrastructural investments, we aim to supply sig- nificant part of the enzymes needed by Turkey first, and then by our region. So, you quit your education overseas and returned to Turkey. What should be done to encourage a reverse brain drain to Turkey? How will that contribute to our country? As I mentioned earlier, when I was in the USA, I always dreamt of “establishing a biotechnology company capa- ble of producing the enzymes –which we import- using the national and domestic resources.”, relying on the question “How can I contribute to my country, based on my knowledge and experience in biotechnology?” However, I have to make it clear that my dream con- sisted of two phases. It was a must for the company I planned to establish that it should be equipped with the appropriate human resources, if it is to be successful and destined to survive. That’s why I returned to my country with the dream and goal of “realizing the two projects consisting of the establishment of a biotech- nology company and a biotechnology institute, which would proceed simultaneously”. I remember asking myself frequently as I sometimes sipped my coffee at Harvard’s Longwood campus: “Why wouldn’t we, too, establish an institute in Turkey, like MIT Whitehead in the USA, Karolinska in Sweden, Max Plank in Germany or Weizmann in Israel?“ These institutes that I have referred here are the leading research organiza- tions that carry out advanced studies and get certain priv- ileges, under the auspices of the most visionary universi- ties in their individual countries. I believe that, as the number of institutes increases in our country, like the one we established under the roof of Bezmialem Vakif University and our initiatives such as LIVZYM prove to be successful, it will be easier for our human resources overseas to return to the country. So, you claim that you will decrease 100% depen- dence on foreign resources for the enzymes needed by our country, with the factory you put into service. How will that contribute to our country? What do you think should be done to be more effective in this respect? Unfortunately, the export price per kilogram in our coun- try is well below what is desired: “$1,23 as of the end of 2019.” In order to break our current production and export cycle, it will be required to encourage and support the ini- tiatives in the innovative sectors that create added value. There are successful examples before us. Thanks to the appropriate support given to the Defence Industry, our av- erage export income per kilogram is $62 in this sector. I sincerely believe that a success story, which is sim- ilar to the added value created in the defence industry 50 times higher than the average of our country, can be achieved in the field of biotechnology, as well. I would like to bring another example to your attention, from a different viewpoint. Denmark’s population is 5.8 million only. However, Denmark managed to create multi- ple companies operating in this field, which are worth over tens of billions of dollars, thanks to its strategy prioritising the growth in biotechnology sector. LIVZYM broke new ground by realizing the production of enzyme, one of the most challenging applications of bio- technology, in Turkey. In the field of enzymes; we managed to accomplish all of the stages in “R&D, investment financing, production in industrial scale and selling to the market”. So, we aim to share with our country, what we have learned so far and grow together with other stakeholders, as part of this process.