Date posted: December 10, 2007

ABDULHAMİT YILDIZ, İSTANBUL

The trade summits organized by the Turkish Confederation of Businessmen and Industrialists (TUSKON) are a good way to establish new business contacts between entrepreneurs, thus creating new investment opportunities for businessmen.

Hatemoğlu, a leading textile company, for instance, found a Kyrgyz distributor during the first edition of the Turkey-Eurasia trade summit last year and is now looking for more distributors at this year’s gathering. “Our aim is to have distributors in all the countries between İstanbul and Shanghai, all along the Silk Road. TUSKON is helping us find the distributors we need,” said Hatemoğlu Chairman Hatem Saykı.Hatemoğlu company officials met with Sametey Ömürgazi Uulu and following negotiations, Efsane Duran, Hatemoğlu’s director of foreign trade and marketing, signed an agreement with Uulu last year. Uulu, who was educated at a Turkish school established by Turkish businessmen in Kyrgyzstan, embraced the Hatemoğlu brand in a short time and opened his first store immediately. He now plans to open the second store in 2008. Uulu underlined that speaking Turkish has been advantageous for him.

Hatemoğlu, which makes the Hatemoğlu, Hatem Saykı and @Html brands, operates six stores in the Netherlands, Kyrgyzstan, Spain and Kazakhstan.

Russian gas provider Zao Stav wants to invest $250 million in cooperation with Turkish businessmen. Having taken several steps with four Turkish companies, Zao Stav will focus in particular on natural gas equipment and installation, which will be used in all phases, including the building of pipelines as well as the end consumer.

Valentin Kartushin, an official from Zao Stav, said they produce equipment used in the gas and petroleum industry in Russia’s Stavropol region. He also noted that their company has annual revenues of more than $350 million, adding that 85 percent of their products are sold in the domestic market while the rest are exported to Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan. Kartushin underlined that Zao Stav will focus on Trabzon and the Black Sea region in its first phase. “The ongoing negotiations here in Turkey are going very well. Turkish companies are evaluating our offers. We expect to receive a positive response.”

Another businessman who attended the TUSKON summit is Bojchuk Anatoly Yakalevich, a representative of Russia’s Opora company, which works in particular in the development of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Stavropol. Yakalevich is also looking for a partner for the company’s residential projects. “We built residential units and shopping malls in Russia; we now want to work on bigger projects,” he said.

Yakalevich said that they began negotiating with some Turkish companies on a $15 million residential project, adding: “But we also have plans for a $100 million project in the medium term. We want to produce and market our products jointly with Turkish businessmen.”

Source: Today’s Zaman December 7,  2007

Tags: Asia | Hizmet and business |