If there’s one thing I keep hearing over and over when it comes to the European startup scene, it’s that investors who are not seriously looking at the Turkish market may be missing out on some of the continent’s biggest digital companies in the next 10 years.
My plan is to go to Turkey some day and investigate this burgeoning startup ecosystem up close, and I hope that trip will take me to some of its marvelous cities and beautiful beaches.
I digress, I digress.
Our sources in Turkey (local tech blog Webrazzi) tell us Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Tiger Global have invested between $25 million and $30 million in private shopping site Trendyol.
The Kleiner Perkins investment reportedly values the Istanbul startup at roughly $150 million.
My Turkish is a little rusty, but looking at the site I’m going to assume it is the local version of the likes of Vente-privée, Gilt, Beyond The Rack and HauteLook. There’s also Google’s Boutiques.com, eBay’s fashion store and Amazon’s MyHabit, of course.
According to Webrazzi, Trendyol earlier raised a $2 million and a $10 million round, and that some of the shareholders cashed out as a result of this third round of financing.
This is reportedly the first investment Kleiner Perkins has made in Turkey.