Despite political turmoil, Fintech startups in Turkey are still able to grow. iyzico, a Turkey based payment solutions company, this week closed a $15 million Series C investment round with the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the World Bank’s investing arm, Istanbul based venture capital firm 212 and UK-based VC Amadeus Capital Partners which invested $2 million.
The investment, which brings iyzico’s financing to date to nearly $25 million, will allow iyzico to expand its research and development team, and scale its payment technology globally.
Iyzico launched in Iran last year but since it looks beyond Turkey, the company also plans to target the markets of the Middle East to bring its payment solution to the many online companies scaling up from Lebanon to Jordan and other countries.
Brbaros Ozbugutu, CEO of iyzico commented: “Since our launch in 2013, iyzico has become the leading online payment provider in Turkey. Earlier last year we expanded into Iran. With this investment round, we will be eager to roll out our services in other markets in the Middle East and Europe and thus push fintech further forward. We will realise our plan to become the “payment champion” of the region.”
Dave Nangle, Managing Director of Vostok Emerging Finance (VEF) added: “We are very excited to announce our investment into Iyzico, and indeed our first move into the Turkish market. iyzico is comfortably one of the best online Payments plays we have come across in the emerging arena. Turkey offers a very rich opportunity set in the payments space, while there is a wealth of experience in the iyzico team which is what really drew us to this opportunity.”
