Tech

Selçuk Bayraktar

Left an MIT doctorate to build UAVs at his father's machining company in Istanbul.

Born: 1979 · Istanbul, Turkey
Roots: Turkish; family from the Black Sea region (Trabzon)
Family: Middle class; Father founded Baykar in 1984 as a small machining shop supplying auto parts in Istanbul.
Education: Istanbul Technical University → UPenn (MS) → MIT (PhD program, left)
Started with: Family firm; Built the UAV program inside Baykar, his father's existing company.
Affiliations & societies: None documented.; Information only — claims like these are often unverifiable and may be wrong.

The pathway

2004 · age 25
First mini-UAV flight tests
Flight-tests early prototypes developed with Baykar while studying in the US.
2007 · age 28
Leaves MIT, returns to Turkey
Drops the doctorate to run Baykar's UAV development full-time.
2014 · age 35
Bayraktar TB2 first flight
The armed drone enters Turkish service the same year.
2016 · age 37
Marries Sümeyye Erdoğan
Daughter of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
2020 · age 41
TB2 in foreign conflicts
Use in Syria, Libya, and Nagorno-Karabakh draws international attention and export orders.
2023 · age 44
Turkey's top defense exporter~$1.8B exports
Baykar reports roughly 90% of its revenue from exports to 30+ countries.

Sources

Compiled from these references and contemporaneous press reporting. Figures are approximate; verify before relying on them.