Sunday August 30th 2015, a turkish delegation consisting of founders and members of Etohum investor club visited Iran. Founders of Etohum and Turkey’s startup community leaders gathered together at Tehran’s Avatech Accelerator to share their experiences and give a highlight of Turkey’s Startup scene.
The gathering began at 9 AM at Avatech over a short breakfast. Burak Buyukdemir went up on stage and gave a little history of Etohum, Turkey’s famous startup accelerator, and continued to tell the story of how he started his community building journey which the outcome was Startup Istanbul and Startup Turkey. Some mentions of Etohum graduates were made. Burak continue to talk about the great opportunity the regions holds.
“Today The internet and mobile penetration is very high in Iran and Turkey. So the economy behind the internet is very robust and it creates value.”
Burak also talked about Etohum invesment club which consist of succesfull entrepreneurs looking to invest in Turkish startups or beyond borders.
Murat Şahin was the next to speak. The sucssesfull Turkish entrepreneur talked about how by detecting the problem and providing a solutions, SecureDrive was founded. Şahin continued to talk entrepreneurship mentallity and how the Turks are solving one problem at a time.
Kerim Türe, Founder of Madonisa, World’s most famous muslim fashion e-commerce, and co-founder of Etohum went up on stage with a very inspiring speech. Kerim talked with his audience from an entrepreneurs prespective and an investor. Kerim explained how he saw a problem in the muslim women fashion world and how he came up with the solution called Madonisa.
- Kerim Ture Founder of Madonisa
After the Talks 10 Teams from Avatech’s cycle went up to pitch infront of the Turkish a delegation and continuing that 5 team from Avatech’s first cycle went and got feed back from the expert audience.
After the lunch break, Avatech teams had one on one mentorship with Etohum investors club members.
In terms of economy and customer behavior, Iran and Turkey are very familiar. Though Iran’s startup ecosystem is much younger than the neighbored country, it is evident that is growing in a very fast pace. Exchanging experience and knowledge between the 2 countries could help Iranian entrepreneurs to learn from their neighbors mistakes and empower themselves in a much faster and smart way.
Turkey’s startup ecosystem has revolutionized in the past few years with some significant international exists. Iranian Startup community builders have always looked upon Turkey as a vibrant startup community and got tips and ideas on how to grow the local ecosystem better. It is safe to say the two country’s startup community will be more in contact and engaged with each other with these events, and more mutual experience will be shared in the future.
Stay tuned for Techrasa’s exclusive interview with Burak Buyukdemir and Kerim Türe.
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