1 out of 5 Design Centers is Employed for the Textile Industry

With the Law No. 5746, textile is the leading sector among the industries with supported design centers, with 70 design centers and 19 percent overall share.

Within the framework of Law No. 5746 on Supporting Research, Development and Design Activities that has been published in the Official Gazette, the concept of “Design Centers” made its entrance into the legislation and many important supports were provided to them.

The textile sector, which has been at the top among all industries with its 70 design centers, has a share of over 19 percent and has gained a serious momentum through the design centers, which were supported since 2016. The textile industry is followed by the manufacturing industry and the engineering and architecture sectors.

Istanbul, being the leader with regards to its R&D center number among other provinces, is also at the top position in the number of design centers. Currently, 160 design centers operate in Istanbul. Ankara follows Istanbul with its 42 design centers, İzmir with 28 centers, Bursa with 25 centers and Denizli with 21 centers.

İbrahim Gedikoğlu, Managing Partner of Etkin Proje, expressed that a significant employment opportunity was created with the incentive, further declared the following: ‘‘The number of design centers across the country increased to 364 as of February. The design centers operating in 34 different sectors in Turkey’s 23 provinces assisted the employment of thousands of people. In particular, we consider that as much company as possible should benefit from this incentive so that the country can produce value-added services and increase exports volume.’’

Within the design centers, where 4 thousand 980 projects were accomplished in various sectors such as textile, manufacturing industry, machinery, automotive, electronics, energy and mining, the number of patents registered until 2019 was 141, the number of registered brands was 810, and the number of registered designs was 250 thousand.

5 Necessities to Become a Design Center

The Design Center functions as an order-based system. It operates as a separate unit within an already established company or firm. There are 5 requirements for the realization of the design center activities:

• Having at least 10 Full Time Equivalent Design personnel in the Design Center, who will be employed as designers and technicians
• Having design projects
• Carrying out the design activities domestically
• The design center is organized as a separate unit and is located in a particular physical space
• Having mechanisms to perform physical monitoring of design and support staff working in the Design Center