Born blind, Kursat Ceylan used his lived experience to innovate and empower himself as well as other people of determination.
“The technology world is really exciting. But as a blind person, I still had to rely on my traditional white cane,” he tells Ihsan Anabtawi, COO and CMO of Microsoft UAE in the first part of the Tech for Everyone episode in the Future Now podcast series.
“Just before the inception of WeWalk, I was in New York to give a speech at the United Nations. While going to my hotel, I was using my traditional white cane with one hand and holding my smartphone to get the GPS direction with the other. At the same time, I had to pull my luggage. Not surprisingly, I bumped into a pole. This is not just my problem. There are more than 250 million visually impaired in the world. That’s why we started to work on WeWalk technology.”
WeWalk is a patented smart cane technology that thousands of visually impaired people today use. With the help of analytical data, cloud technology, AI and more, WeWalk ensures improved mobility and an enriching life for them.
With over a billion people with a disability, technology is not only helping the visually impaired but other people of determination too. "Technology is helping us to think limitless," he says.
The second part of Tech for Everyone will be released next Wednesday, September 28.
Catch all the episodes of Future Now produced by Gulf News in association with Micorsoft UAE here. They are also available on all the leading podcast channels as well as agnc3 by Gulf News’ YouTube channel.
