Under the leadership of the Investment Office, a Turkish delegation, including relevant public organizations, technoparks, startups, and VC executives participated in the world's leading technology and startup event, Slush, in the Finnish capital of Helsinki.
During his remarks on the startup event, Investment Office President A. Burak Dağlıoğlu said, "Technology companies in Türkiye have received approximately USD 3.5 billion in investment in the past three years, and a very significant part of this amount came from international investors. Last year, Türkiye ranked 12th in Europe in terms of receiving investments in this field while Istanbul ranked 6th among all the cities of Europe. Istanbul also ranked 2nd in Europe in the gaming industry, just after London."
President Dağlıoğlu stated that Investment Office invites investors to invest in tech startups in Türkiye, and added: "Following Web Summit in Lisbon in November, where we participated under the umbrella of "Invest in Türkiye", we are taking part with Turkish startups at Slush, one of Europe's most important technology events."
Gathering 5,000 entrepreneurs and 3,000 investors, Slush received 13,000 visitors from more than 100 countries in total this year. Showcasing innovations in digital finance services, augmented reality, virtual reality, digital health services and smart medical devices, Turkish startups had the opportunity to meet with the potential investors and to expend their visibility in the international market.
Among the Turkish startups present were Heybooster, a company providing an AI-powered analytics platform for eCommerce businesses without the need for a data analyst or any coding; Macellan, a technology-leading venture studio; Pivony, an omni-channel consumer intelligence platform using Deep Neural Language Understanding; and Vispera, offering IR-based retail execution and tracking services to the retail industry.
On the sidelines of Slush, Investment Office held a panel titled “Türkiye: Home to the Most Female-Founded Unicorns in Europe" moderated by 500 Emerging Europe General Partner Enis Hulli and attended by approximately 150 people.
During the panel, Fark Labs and Arya Women's Investment Platform Founder Ahu Serter, Trendyol Head of International Partner Business Burcu Yaşar, and Armut.com Co-founder Başak Taşpınar Değim discussed Türkiye's advanced technology ecosystem as well as women's entrepreneurship in Türkiye, which has the highest proportion of female founders among startups that have become unicorns in Europe.