212 Capital Partners Invests in Turkish Supply Chain Design Company Solvoyo
212 Capital Partners, one of Turkey’s leading
early stage venture capital funds, has announced its first
investment of the year in Solvoyo, a software as a service (SaaS) company based
in Boston and Istanbul.
The $1 million in investment is a first for Solvoyo, which was
founded by Turkish entrepreneurs in 2008, and has risen to
profitability by providing supply chain optimization software to
leading companies around the globe. Most recently, the company won
a contract with Home Depot, beating out some of the biggest global
names in its sector, says Dilek Dayinlarli, VP at 212 Ltd., which
manages 212 Capital Partners.
The investment will help Solvoyo expand its marketing and scale its
flagship product, PlanLM, by developing an out-of-the-box version
to cater to startups and small businesses, says Dayinlarli. Gartner
estimates the Global Supply Chain Management (SCM) software market
will expand at a compound annual growth rate of 9% from 2011-2015;
Solvoyo is likely betting that startups will comprise a large part
of that growth.
For Turkey, this funding is yet another confirmation, following
General Atlantic’s investment in Yemeksepeti, that its domestic
market can produce viable global and regional players. For the
Middle East, it’s a promise of what’s to come as the Arab market
continues to mature; while the two markets are very different,
Turkish players have estimated that the Turkish
scene is only about 3-5 years ahead of the Levant startup
environment.
For 212 Ltd., making Solvoyo its 7th portfolio company continues a
trend of funding startups that can scale internationally. “We
really want to invest in technology in Turkey, especially companies
that create global products, ” says Dayinlarli. “We believe
that SaaS companies are going to be big in the coming decade.”
Many of the fund’s other investments, including
Butigo,
ArcadeMonk, and
HemenKiralik, will be entering the Arab world this year, as
others, like
Cloudarena, serve a global market.
For Middle East entrepreneurs looking to go global, Solvoyo’s
example offers three main tips: get the best education you can (the
two founders have PhDs from Georgia Tech), obsess about your
technology (Diyanlarli credits the company’s mathematical algorithm
with its success), and take advantage of your small initial size by
knowing how to serve startups- a booming B2B market- better than
the big guys.