Defence Turkey: Could you briefly inform us about the activities performed by HeliPLAT?

Fuat AKPINAR: On January 1, 2016, I retired from the Naval Forces Naval Command. I was the Navy's first platform inspector and I also served as the trainer inspector. The Defense Industry Agency (SSB) and Shipyards’ management called me when I retired and encouraged me to start a business to support them. They said they were supporting me as well. The requirement to carry out the Helicopter Platform Certification process of the ships with entirely national capabilities occurred during the process that started with the manufacturing of MILGEMs, our national warships. Starting with MILGEMs, our company is responsible for managing all aspects of the certification of the helicopter platforms for the LST Class Ships (Sancaktar and Bayraktar), Submarine Rescue (Alemdar), and Towing Ships (Akın-Işın), Fleet Replenishment Ship (DİMDEG), TUSK Corvette built for Turkmenistan, QTS Class Ships (Al Doha and Al Shamal) built for Qatar, and OPVs built for Nigeria.