eBay announced today that it has increased its stake in GittiGidiyor, Turkey's leading ecommerce company to 93%. This is a landmark transaction for Turkish internet. Congratulations to Serkan, Burak, Tolga, Aydonat, and the team at iLab! This is the fruit of a lot of hard work.
The real winner in the deal is the Turkish internet, ecommerce and VC industries. This is the first internet exit of a magnitude that creates real wealth for the entrepreneurs. That means the case for internet entrepreneurship as a viable career path for the best and the brightest coming out of the best schools in Turkey has gotten stronger. The bottleneck of high quality talent for web startups might just get a bit eased.
I bet there are tens of LP presentation decks being updated today, as this transaction gets added to the top of the page dealing with the tough question of internet exits in Turkey. A similar update will take place in corporate development departments of any global internet companies, as Turkey becomes more and more visible on the international M&A roadmap.
Finally, this is also a personal landmark for me and my career as an entrepreneur and investor in Turkey. I'd met the GG team back in 2005 and had the chance to work on the deal alongside the iLab team in 2006. Back then, I had felt that this was the greatest Turkish internet company to invest in. It's nice to see that after 6 years, eBay agreed.
Cem, congrats. I saw this deal and thought you must have been involved. Cheers, Steve
Posted by: Steve Richmond | April 12, 2011 at 09:21 PM
Congratulations Cem! Hopefully, this is only the beginning of a positive trend in Turkey.
Cheers!
Murat
Posted by: Murat Cannoyan | April 13, 2011 at 02:46 PM
Congratulations Cem. This is another very important milestone for Turkish VC industry. Thank you for supporting Turkish internet startups and helping the ecosystem grow.
Bests,
M. Nedim
Posted by: Mntokman.wordpress.com | April 13, 2011 at 05:39 PM
Mr Sertoglu,
What you think of new e-commerce restrictions that announced at 21 April by minister Hayati Yazıcı. With new "restrictions", there is a limit on buying from foreign internet based e-commerce sites and companies about 5 items per a year. Should it be related with the news about eBay and GG.
Thanks
Posted by: MM | April 22, 2011 at 10:06 AM
@mm I think it's an important development that evens the playing field for Turkish ecommerce companies.
Posted by: csertoglu | April 22, 2011 at 05:38 PM
Evens? Or the e-commerce system for customers turns into monopoly? Unfortunately i am not seeing this as a development, this kind of "restrictions" only can be seen at undeveloped countries. To sum up, this will make the rich, richer. You think customers will use Turkish ecommerce sites much more than ever? With that price differences i dont think so. And one word for the GG, if eBay wants to have a good position in Turkish ecommerce, they should fight with counterfeit products. GG is full of only counterfeit and illegaly transfered to Turkey products.
Posted by: MM | April 24, 2011 at 02:18 PM