

Turkey’s tech businesses

Boom on the Bosporus

Lots of young people, eager to shop and play online: no wonder Turkey’s internet industry is crowded

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Readers' comments



Turkish tech companies will continue to surprise and impress other European competitors and collaborators. @kenpmorse


Picture of a large mosque in an article about tech companies. So you can only imagine mosques when you think about Turkey. This is really interesting to me.

Merthan in reply to TRolandB

No it isn't Hagia Sofia, the mosque in the picture is Sultanahmet Mosque, hardly a big symbol. By the way, Hagia Sofia is not a mosque, it is a museum, a museum of both its Christian and Islamic past. Nobody is allowed to pray in Hagia Sofia.

Inshai in reply to Merthan

West worries about the Mosques,Koran,Islam....turrets of the Mosques scares them as Howezters ready for possible battles...they had to enlist Arabs to defeat Ottoman Empire...


Turkey is an upcoming economy and no doubt the online space will grow. In the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region the online startups have started getting exposure and funding. UAE startups have attracted the largest amount of investments with an overall estimate of $74 Million in 2012. A report on Investment in Online Startups in the Middle East and North Africa



In a country where people are ordering McDonald's food ONLINE, and when Domino's pizza delivery takes shorter than an ambulance call; not a big surprise I guess.


I have visited Turkey several times - lovely country, lovely people. You say that Turkish farmers do not keep pigs, but I have twice seen wild boar being kept as pets by apparently Muslim families.


i could not understand the relation between a mosque, online game, tech; the writers sees Turkey as an islamic country due to the ruling party in turkey, and thats why S/he relates anything with islam, even internet game business with islam; but she misses to mention about the mental approach of akp followers to those games , which is that it is just a game, imaginary not real, time-consuming thing; no sin could be made in playing that farm game with pigs; but those AKP followers cannot understand that nuance, and the writers has unfortunatly joined those ignorant group by mentioning any unrelated materials like mosque or the title of tech but that fact while implying akp followers and their game business in an article that promises to mention about the tech in turkey.

i just want to say that the readers of this article should also read other articles about Turkey in the economist. in each article you will see either a pkk terror group blessing articles or AKP praising islamic articles like this one.

Turkey is a democratic and secular country since 1923; the current ruling party and its rootes cannot change the fact!

erol deniz

Turkey is western And Europen Country for Arabs and Iranians however for the westerners Turkey is eastern muslim country.
Go to Turkey and make your on decision.

Germanambassador in reply to erol deniz

You are right.
Turkey is an open country.
This is one of the reasons why so many Germans each year love to spend their holidays with the Turkish in their country.
Holidays among friends.
And many Germans meanwhile move to Turkey.
Turkey is a much more open-minded country as the Uk or France will be.
Never heard anti-German rants in Turkey:)
Turkey will make its way and I think Germany will support Turkey.
The relationship between Germany and Turkey will always be something very special and never comparable to the relationships to any other country.
Erdogan was great and welcome when he came to Germany.

Cihan Salim

A publication like The Economist shouldn't make this many mistakes in a news article... What is local, what is Turkish and what is regioanal is mixed up... BTW Turkey is not an Arabic country, and the language is not Arabic

Calm down, it doesn't say Turkey's an 'Arabic' country, it says there's an Arabic version of Happy Farm developed by a firm in Istanbul. As the article points out, some at least realise the business world's bigger than Turkey...

Calm down? It was not a patriotic reaction so I don't need to calm down, don't worry.
I'm doing international business, previously worked for world's leading companies in Turkey. What has just surprised me is the editorial lack of depthness and lack of needed & simple research, as I'm also a columnist for more than 10 years, writing on Turkish Internet and e-commerce ecosystem!
BTW it implies that Arabic is spoken in Turkey in the opening at the time I read the article I don't know if something ic corrected later on. There're business related mistakes as well:(
Anyway, as a good reader of The Economist I was believing that each piece was well researched and developed, but after what I see in this peiece, I feel that I won't be able to fully rely on what will be published in future issues... I'm sorry for that.

It's not a matter of business knowledge and I have no reason to doubt your experience - I just think you're misreading the article. It's possible that the article has changed since you commented, but I have the print version here which is the same, and the Economist is usually quite up-front about corrections. It could have been phrased more clearly, but I doubt there was any intention to mislead.

So what is the current state of tech sector in Turkey?

Turkish Psycho

Wild Boar is hunted in Turkey, and maybe sometimes eaten too.

Looks like, Economist has an interest to market Turkey as a mono-cultural, non-secular country. But This marketing strategy works for the time being.
You can't put the whole country into one box.

Jack watson

Turkey seems like the economic model for Arab nations to follow the steps Where the only monopoly of few companies control the whole telecommunication sector


Post War Germany was industrialised by the Turkish"Guest Workers" to sell,Mercedes,Volkswagons,Bosch,.....to the world.Germany is king pin in the EU because of the Turkish-Germans...

Germanambassador in reply to Inshai


Indeed and you are right and meanwhile (unfortunately too late) the Germans are grateful to you and
fortunately many of you have a German passport.:)
We are proud of you.

Stephen D. Oaks

It is not forbidden to eat/keep pigs in Turkey; it is just not easy to find in cities because people prefer not to eat, therefore stores don't sell pork. In countryside, pork is easy to find and I myself am enjoying a nice crispy bacon right now.

Also, Turkey is not an Arabic country. Turkish people are not arabic. Arabic is not spoken in Turkey and for over 99% of the people it is just plain gibberish.

Turkey is definitely NOT an islamic country and will never will be despite what the U.S. wants.

Get your facts straight.

Also, Turkey is not an Arabic country.

Very well said. I completely agree.
France is an arabic country with an arabic population of more than 4 millions.

Being muslim does never mean that you must be an arab.

And parts of former Yugoslavia is also no arabic country -only because people there are moslems.
In Germany I do not see any problem between Turkish and Germans, Muslims or Germans.
It is nothing but a matter of mutual respect and real integration.
If Mr. Sarazzin is talking of some problems he means a few local spots in Germany that make problems but in a wide range and in general it works very well.

Ahmet017 in reply to Stephen D. Oaks

Turkey IS an Islamic country. A country doesn't have to be Arab to qualify to be Muslim. Furthermore, Arabic isn't plain gibberish. Our language has borrowed many words from Arabic for the same reason and to the same extent that English has borrowed Latin vocabulary. Lastly, the US has nothing to do with any of this.


Turkey is the new powerhouse of the European continent:)
Congratulations to all my Turkish friends. You are just great and give an outstanding example to your Greek cousins how it works:)
Germany can be proud of the everlasting Turkish-German friendship.
And Germany is proud of those many Turkish co-citizens who gave their contribution to Germany:)
Thank you:)



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