Rahmi Koç

Rahmi Mustafa Koç is a Turkish businessman.

He was born in 1930 in Ankara as the only son of one of Turkey's wealthiest man Vehbi Koç, he attended high school at Robert College in Istanbul after his primary education in Ankara. Rahmi Koç then studied at the Johns Hopkins University in the U.S. and received his B.A. in Industrial Management.

Career

Following his military service, he started actively working for the Koç Group in 1958 joining the Otokoç Company in Ankara. In 1960, he transferred to Koç Ticaret, which represented the Koç Group in Ankara. Following the relocation of the Koç Holding headquarters from Ankara to Istanbul in 1964, which was established a year earlier, he became general coordinator of Koç Holding A.Ş. and moved to Istanbul.

Thereafter in 1970, he became chairman of the executive committee and in 1975 deputy chairman of the board of management. Rahmi Koç was appointed chairman of the Koç Holding management committee in 1980. His father Vehbi Koç transferred his chairmanship to his son on March 30, 1984. Rahmi Koç retired from this duty on April 4, 2003 transferring his chair to his eldest son Mustafa Koç. Rahmi Koç is currently Honorary Chairman of the Koç Holding.

He has three sons: Mustafa Vehbi (1960), Ömer Mehmet (1962) and Ali Yıldırım (1967) from his previous marriage to Çiğdem Simavi, who later married the former newspaper tycoon Haldun Simavi.

Koç Holding

Vehbi Koç, who died in 1996 at the age of 95, created the Koç Holding Corp., Turkey's largest industrial conglomerate. By first forming joint ventures with General Electric to make light bulbs and Ford Motor Co. to build buses and trucks, and continually expanding his activities, Koç built up an empire that, according to the Financial Times generates nearly 5% of Turkish exports. Koç Holding Corp. has more than $12 billion in sales annually and employs 40,000 people.

Social life

During the meeting of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) on November 7, 1994, Rahmi Koç was elected as the Chairman of the ICC for the term 1995-1996.

Rahmi Koç is a Rotarian and a member of the Istanbul Open Sea Yacht Club and New York Yachting Club.

Visit to Henry Ford Museum in Michigan inspired him to create the Rahmi M Koç Museum in Istanbul, which is dedicated to the history of transport, industry and communications exhibiting trains, submarines and autos.

The company and the Koç Foundation are known for their commitment to philanthropy, especially in the area of education.

Honorary doctorates

Rahmi Koç received honorary doctorates from following Turkish and American universities:

• May 21, 1998 Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
• September 28, 1998 Anadolu University, Eskişehir
• May 14, 1999 Ege University, İzmir
• June 14, 1999 Bilkent Üniversitesi, Ankara
• April 23, 2001 Ovidius University, Constanţa, Romania.

Awards

He was awarded by various national and international institutions as listed below:

• German "Großes Verdienstkreuz" (Great Cross of Merit)
• June 18, 2001 Italian "Ordine al Merito della Repubblica" (Order of Merit of the Republic)
• October 27, 1997 Turkish "State Medal of Distinguished Service" by President Suleyman Demirel.^[1]

See also

• List of billionaires

References

External links

• Forbes World's Richest People 2003
• Koç Holding A.Ş.
• Vehbi Koç Foundation (Turkish)
• Koç University
• Koç School
• Rahmi M. Koç Museum