Esma Dilek was born in Denizli, Turkey in 1981. After completing her elementary and middle school education in Denizli-Turkey, she graduated from Yıldız Technical University (YTU) with a degree in Computer Science and Engineering in 2003.

After working as a software engineer for about 1.5 years in private sector, she started working as a Computer Engineer at the Traffic Directorate of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IMM) in 2006.

As part of the local government-funded overseas study project initiated by Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality in 2008, she had an opportunity to get a master’s degree in USA. In 2010, she earned her master’s degree from Boston University (BU) in Computer Science and was awarded with “Certificate in Academic Excellence”.

After graduation from BU, she continued working as a Software Development Specialist at the Traffic Directorate of IMM. During the time period until April 2015, at which time she was assigned to be Deputy Traffic Manager, she worked in many projects as an Intelligent Transportation Systems software developer for desktop, internet and mobile platforms at the Traffic Control Center, which operates under Transport Department of IMM. Over the three years working as the Deputy Traffic Manager, she also served as Technical and Administrative Officer of all Intelligent Transportation Systems components, systems and software of the IMM, which was managed by IMM’s Traffic Control Center.

During the years she was employed at the Traffic Directorate of IMM, she worked as Project Manager in many international projects carried out by Transportation Department of IMM. She also worked as the Project Manager of VITAL and Roadmaps for Energy (R4E) Projects, under which IMM was eligible to receive grants within the 7th Framework and Horizon 2020 programs of the European Union.

Ms. Dilek has many research papers about Intelligent Transportation Systems and the effects of mega projects on Istanbul’s transportation, which were presented and published in various international congresses.

Ms. Dilek served as the Director of Information Technology (IT) and the Director of Smart Cities for the IMM between August 2018 and April 2020. As of April 28, 2020, Ms. Dilek was appointed as the Deputy Director General at Directorate General of Communications at Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure and she is currently serving in this position. She was elected as the new president of Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Association of Turkey (ITS Turkey) as of  March 31, 2021. Some of her duties as a public representative and an NGO president can be summarized as follows:

·         Determining the ITS policies, strategies and goals and monitoring their implementation,

·         Ensuring nationwide adoption of identified standards to provide interoperability between intelligent transport systems and applications,

·         Conducting legislation studies and establishing the official authority in order to deploy communication infrastructures vital for the interoperability of these systems,

·         Preparing National ITS Architecture,

·         Identifying the standards of ITS systems to be followed in our country,

·         Establishing a Data Center for measuring and managing mobility,

·         Using Disruptive and Innovative Technologies within ITS Applications,

·         Gathering all actors such as official institutions and organizations, commercial companies, NGOs, universities, software companies, municipalities working on Intelligent Transportation Systems under a single umbrella,

·         Deploying, monitoring and expanding the ITS infrastructure in Turkey in a holistic and sustainable manner by providing compatibility between each national ITS projects.

Ms. Esma Dilek is also fluent in English.