Ahter Kutadgu was born on May 5, 1963 in Istanbul. He completed his secondary education at Saint-Joseph French High School and his higher education at Istanbul University Faculty of Law. After his legal internship at the law office of Dr. Sahir Talat Akev, he obtained his lawyer’s license in 1988 at Istanbul Bar Association and began his career. After a one-year self-employed practice, he completed his military service at the end of 1989. Ahter joined Ditaş-Deniz İşletmeciliği ve Tankerciliği A.Ş. in 1990 as legal advisor. On June 1991, he started to work at Mobil Oil Türk A.Ş. as Legal Advisor and later as Assistant General Counsel until July 1995. In August 1995, he was assigned to Unilever Turkey as General Counsel responsible for Unilever’s operations in Turkey and Turkic Republics until November 1999. In December 1999 he was assigned as Unilever Turkey’s Board Member in charge of legal and corporate affairs. After carrying out that duty for 3 years, in November 2002 Ahter was transferred to Nestlé Turkey as a board member responsible for legal and corporate affairs. During his duty at Nestlé, he was appointed by Nestlé Global Headquarters as ‘leader of sustainability of Turkey, Middle East, Middle Asia, North Africa Management Team’. In May 2005, he was assigned as Corporate Affairs Director of Sabancı Holding reporting to the Chairperson. In June 2006, he was transferred to the newly privatized Türk Telekom as Assistant General Manager responsible for corporate affairs until August 2007. In September 2007, he founded his private company ‘Kutadgu Consultancy’ to serve national and international companies and organizations in consultancy services such as reputation management, organizational and management re-structuring, crisis management, legal, public affairs and government relations. Then, in July 2014, he continued his career as Vice President responsible for corporate affairs and Corporate Spokesman of Doğan Holding until March 2017. Presently, he is serving as consultant to Aydın Doğan, Honorary Chairman of the Doğan Group.
During his professional career, Ahter acted as board member at International Investors Association of Turkey (YASED) and at several NGOs operating in FMCG and retail sector. Besides, he took part in community involvement activities in various NGOs i.e. Community Volunteers Foundation, Association of Private Sector Volunteers as founder and board member. He acted as Vice-President of International Investments Council of TOBB and President of International Food Companies’ Committee of YASED.
He is married and father of three daughters and the author of the books named ‘Kızlarıma Notlar’ and ‘Anadolu’.
Practice Areas:
- Corporate and Commercial
- Mergers and Acquisitions
- Foreign Direct Investments
- Company Restructuring and Compliance
- Real Estate Law
- Competition Law
- Consumer Products
- Media Law
- Labor and Industrial Relations
Education:
- University of Istanbul Law Faculty (LLB)
- Lycee Français Saint Joseph D’Istanbul
Admissions and Memberships: Muğla Bar Association
Languages: English, French
E-mail: ahter.kutadgu@kutadgu.av.tr