Senior Management

After graduating from İstanbul High school (İstanbul Erkek Lisesi), Gökhan Erün earned his undergraduate degree from İstanbul Technical University - Department of Electronics and Communications and graduate degree from Yeditepe University - Business Administration. Erün began his career at Garanti Bank Treasury Department in 1994. Between 1999-2004, Erün served as the Senior Vice President of Commercial Marketing and Sales Department. After becoming the CEO of Garanti Pension and Life in 2004, he was appointed as Executive Vice President of Garanti Bank in September 2005. Erün began to serve as the Deputy CEO of Garanti Bank in September 2015, also in charge of Corporate Banking, Treasury, Treasury Marketing and Financial Solutions, Derivatives, Cash Management and Transaction Banking, and Financial Institutions. At the same time, he was Board Chairman and Board Member in various local and international subsidiaries of Garanti Bank. As of January 2018, Erün has continued his career in Yapı Kredi as Executive Director in Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer (CEO). In addition, Erün is the CEO of Koç Financial Services and holds positions in the Boards of various Yapı Kredi Group subsidiaries, Koç Finansman A.Ş. and Allianz Yaşam ve Emeklilik A.Ş. Also as of April 2021, Erün became the President of Koç Holding’s Banking Group.

Mehmet Erkan Akbulut graduated from Business Administration Department of Faculty of Political Science at Ankara University in 1989. He started his career in Yapı Kredi Bankası as an Assistant Internal Auditor, then worked as Department Manager in Credits Management, then as Directors in Corporate Banking Management and Commercial Banking Management. He had been expatriated to Yapı Kredi Azerbaijan and worked as Assistant General Manager, Credits between 2009 and 2013. Returning to Yapı Kredi, he worked as Director and then Group Director in Monitoring and Workout in Corporate and Commercial Credits between 2013 and 2018. Between 2018 and 2020 he worked as the Group Director of Corporate and Commercial Credits Underwriting. He worked as a Head of Collection and Workout Management between the dates of 2020 August – 2021 August. As of August 2021 he has been serving as Assistant General Manager – Credits and Yapı Kredi Bank Executive Committee Member. Akbulut is also a member of the Board of Directors of Yapı Kredi Faktoring, Yapı Kredi Leasing and Turkish Credit Bureau.

After graduating from the Faculty of Business Administration at Çukurova University, Yakup Doğan started his career at İşbank as an Assistant Specialist in 1992. Between 1996 and 2001, he worked at Ottoman Bank in Senior Management positions responsible for the development of Retail Banking, Credit Cards and Alternative Delivery Channels. In 2001, Doğan joined Koçbank as Alternative Delivery Channels Manager. With the merger of Yapı Kredi and Koçbank in 2006, Doğan held the position of Alternative Delivery Channels Executive Vice President in Yapı Kredi. Doğan has been Assistant General Manager in charge of Alternative Delivery Channels (Limitless Banking) at Yapı Kredi since May 2009. Doğan has been a Member of the Executive Board at Yapı Kredi since October 2020, and he is a Member of the Board of Directors at Yapı Kredi Teknoloji A.Ş., Yapı Kredi Finansal Teknolojiler A.Ş., Yapı ve Kredi Bankası A.Ş. Mensupları Yardım ve Emekli Sandığı Vakfı and Tanı Pazarlama ve İletişim Hizmetleri A.Ş.

Following graduation from Istanbul Technical University / Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Cahit Erdoğan completed his MBA degree from Rochester Institute of Technology. Erdoğan started his professional career at Xerox Corporation (Rochester, NY) as a Business Analyst. In 2000, Erdoğan started his Management Consultancy career by joining Accenture Turkey. Until 2019, he worked in Accenture as Consultant, Manager and Senior Manager and in February 2008, he was appointed as Turkey Country Lead of the Management Consulting. Erdoğan joined Yapı Kredi in 2009 as Chief Information Officer (CIO). Since July 2013, he assumed the position of Assistant General Manager in charge of Information Technologies and Operations at the Bank. Between May 2020 and August 2021, he was the Chief Operations Officer (COO), responsible of Information Technologies, Operations and Analytics. As of August 2021, he appointed as Assistant General Manager of Commercial and SME Banking in Yapı Kredi. Mr. Erdoğan is also a member of the Executive Committee in Yapı Kredi since July 2013, the Chairman of the Board of Directors in Yapı Kredi Technology A.Ş between May 2015- August 2021, he was the member of the Board in Yapı Kredi Investment & Securities A.Ş. between March 2020- September 2021, member of the Board in Yapı Kredi Factoring, Yapı Kredi Leasing, Yapı Kredi Bank Azerbaijan since August 2021, Yapı Kredi Bank Nederland since October 2021, Tanı Marketing and Communucation Services since December 2021, Yapı Kredi Financial Technologies since February 2022.

After graduating from the Department of Economics at Middle East Technical University in 1996, Abdullah Geçer began his professional career at the Undersecretariat of Treasury as an Assistant Sworn Bank Auditor. Having served in this position between 1996 and 2000, Abdullah Geçer assumed Sworn Bank Auditor and Senior Sworn Bank Auditor positions in Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency of Turkey between 2000 and 2007, and completed the MBA in Finance program at University of Nottingham in 2006. Serving as a coordinator in Koç Holding Audit Group in 2007 – 2020, Abdullah Geçer was appointed as the Assistant General Manager for Internal Audit in Yapı Kredi on 20 April 2020.

Mr Karaaslan graduated from Marmara University, Business Administration department in 1999. Between September 1999 and December 2004, he worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) where he joined as an Assistant Auditor and promoted to Audit Manager. He continued his career at Koçbank between 2005 and 2006 as Head of Budget & Planning. In 2006, following the merger of Koçbank and Yapı Kredi Bank, he was appointed as Vice President responsible from Planning & Control. He has been the Head of Planning & Control since 2010 and promoted as Executive Vice President in 2011. Starting from January 2016, he was appointed as Assistant General Manager in charge of Retail Credits. Currently, he continues to serve as Chief Financial Officer (CFO) starting from March 2020. Mr Karaaslan also assumes the positions of member of Board in several subsidiaries of Yapı Kredi Bank. He was also a board member of Credit Bureau and a member of The Banks Association of Turkey Risk Center.

Özden Önaldı graduated from Istanbul Technical University's Department of Management Engineering and earned her Executive MBA degree from Koç University. She began her professional career as a Project Consultant at SAP Company in 1999. Önaldı, later continued her banking career at Osmanlı Bank in the Alternative Distribution Channels department. In 2002, she started working at Garanti Bank, where she led several strategic projects in CRM & Marketing, Strategic Planning, IT, and Human Resources at various management levels. Özden Önaldı joined Koç Holding in 2016 and worked in Human Resources and Industrial Relations Group in digital transformation, agile transformation, and leadership programs areas. As of February 2022, Önaldı has been appointed as the Assistant General Manager of Human Resources Organization and Internal Services and a member of the Executive Committee in Yapı Kredi. She also serves as the Chairperson of Yapı Kredi Group Subsidiaries Disciplinary Committee and the member of Sustainability Committee. As of March 2023, she is a member of the Board in Yapı Kredi Technology, Yapı Kredi Invest, Yapı Kredi Factoring and Yapı Kredi Leasing.

After graduating from Middle East Technical University, Department of Economics in 1989, Mehmet Erkan Özdemir worked as a Sworn-in Bank Auditor on the Sworn-in Bank Audit Board of the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency between April 1994 and August 2001. He joined Koç Holding in September 2001 as Audit Coordinator in the Koçbank Audit Group, responsible for the financial companies of the Group. Özdemir was assigned as Compliance Officer and Assistant General Manager in charge of the Compliance Office in April 2008. Özdemir has been served as Assistant General Manager in charge of Compliance and Internal Control between October 2013 and October 2020. He has been serving as Assistant General Manager in charge of Compliance, Internal Control and Risk Management since October 2020.

Gökhan Özdinç earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Engineering (1997), MBA (1999) and Ph.D. (in Management) (2006) degrees from Boğaziçi University. Özdinç started his career as a software engineer in Finansbank Information Technologies. He managed Card Payment Systems Applications Development, Software Architecture, Business Analysis, Project & Program Management, Digital Channels Applications Development, Data-warehouse & Business Intelligence teams till 2012. He worked as the member of the Management Board responsible from Digital Banking and Data Management teams in Finansbank’s Information Technologies company, IBTECH, between 2012 and 2014. Özdinç was appointed as the COO, responsible from Information Technologies and Banking Operations departments in Aktifbank between 2014 and 2019. At the same time he also assumed the positions of the member of Board in E-kent, NKolay and Çalık Digital, the subsidiaries of Aktifbank.
Özdinç joined Yapı Kredi in 2020 and worked as the Subsidiaries’ Application Development & IT Governance Director and the CIO of Yapı Kredi Invest. As of August 2021, he was appointed as the Assistant General Manager of Yapı Kredi in charge of Technology, Data & Analytics and Process Management, and a member of the Executive Committee. At the same time, Özdinç has been giving lectures in the Department of Management Information Systems and the Department of Management at Boğaziçi University since 2007.

After graduating from Istanbul University Faculty of Law, Cemal Aybars Sanal began his career in 1986 at Sanal&Sanal Law Firm as Partner. Between 1992 and 1995, he worked at Shell Company of Turkey Limited as an Attorney, between 1995 and 1998 at White&Case Law Firm as an Attorney, between 1998 and 1999 at Shell Company of Turkey Limited as Chief Legal Counsel and a Member of the Board of Directors, between 1999 and 2006 at Boyner Holding as Chief Legal Counsel and Vice President. After working as a freelance attorney between 2006 and 2007, Sanal worked at ELIG Law Firm as Senior Consultant from 2007 to 2008. Sanal has been Assistant General Manager in charge of Legal Affairs at Yapı Kredi since July 2008.

Kaan Şakul earned his undergraduate degree from Istanbul University, Economics in English Department in 1996 and earned his graduate degree from Bilgi University, Banking and Finance (MA) in 2015. He started his banking career at Yasarbank in 1996 as Corporate Banking Management Trainee until 2000. After working at Finansbank between 2000 and 2002, he joined Koçbank of Koç Holding. He undertook various positions in branches and Head Office such as Sales Support Manager in Commercial Banking, Commercial and Corporate Branch Manager positions, Corporate and Commercial Credit Underwriting EVP position, Product Groups EVP position including Project Finance, Investment Banking, Cash Management and Trade Finance, Corporate Banking Sales EVP position until 2021 August. He has been assigned by the Board of Directors as Corporate Banking Assistant General Manager and Exco member as of August 2021. He is also member of Sustainability Committee from the beginning.

Serkan Ülgen received his B.S. degree in Industrial Engineering from Bilkent University, Ankara in 1998. Following his graduation, he started his professional career at BENKAR Consumer Financing and Credit Card Services within Boyner Group. In 2001, he joined Yapı Kredi Bank and since then, held different positions in Retail Banking and Card Payment Systems at Yapı Kredi. In this time period he got his MBA degree from Boğaziçi University, Istanbul in 2005.
Serkan Ülgen, has been working as Yapı Kredi's Assistant General Manager responsible for Retail Banking and a member of the Executive Committee since January 1, 2018. Ülgen is also a Member of the Board of Yapı Kredi Bank Azerbaijan, Yapı Kredi Invest and Yapı Kredi Financial Technologies and also Yapı Kredi Pension Fund Foundation.
In addition to his responsibilities in the Bank, Ülgen is also a board member of Interbank Card Center (BKM), Allianz Life and Pension, Tanı Marketing and Communication Services and UK-based 441 Trust Company companies. Also, Ülgen has been serving as the Head of the Supreme Council of Turkey within Visa Turkey and continuing his duty as the Advisory Board Member within MasterCard Europe.

Saruhan Yücel earned his undergraduate degree from Istanbul University Department of Business Administration and his graduate degree from University of Illinois in Business Administration. Yücel started his career at Koçbank in fund Management Department in 2000. Following his role as Securities Portfolio Manager, between 2002 and 2003, in Yapı Kredi Portfolio in Investment Funds Management Fixed Income department, between 2003 and 2018, he worked as FX and Money Markets Senior Dealer, FX Markets Vice President, Fixed Income Securities Vice President and Balance Sheet Management and Fixed Income Securities Executive Vice President in Yapı Kredi Bank. Following June 2018, he continued his career as Treasury Management Assistant General Manager. He is also Member of the Executive Committee at Yapı Kredi Bank.