Author of The Age of Sameness. Exploring how systems shape the conditions for human creativity.

Gulay Ozkan is an entrepreneur and author. For over two decades, through her company GEDS Strategic Design Consultancy, her work has focused on human experience under digital systems through the lens of design.

Selected recognition

As a well-recognized global leader, Gulay has been celebrated as one of 10 innovators at the 99% conference in New York (2012) and acknowledged among 20 strategic design experts in Europe by the UK’s Design Council (2016). 

Invited to Singularity University’s GSP13 program at NASA Ames, her work around humanizing technology and contribution to multi-million-euro projects earned her second place at the DMI 2019 Design Value Awards in Boston. She has also been listed on Fast Company’s Top 100 Female Founders in Turkey and honored with the Microsoft 2020 Woman Leader Making a Difference award. 

Writing and work

Author of The Age of Sameness: A Continuous Life Shaped by Human Creativity and Design Leadership: Past, Present, and Future, she is a longtime SXSW curator and advisory board member shaping AI, 2050, space, and design tracks.

Her writing explores how contemporary technologies, markets, and culture shape the conditions for human creativity, and has been published in multiple languages across four continents.

Based in Istanbul, she works internationally.  Gulay has a reputation for working like an American and living like a Mediterranean, which she believes is the perfect blend.

Her work and writing can be found at gulayozkan.com.