Pandemic doping for startup investments: The game industry became the champion

‘Turkey Startup Investment Report’ prepared by KPMG assesses the performance of the startup ecosystem in the first nine months of the year. According to the report, which reveals the growing interest in digital platforms after the pandemic, investor interest in technology companies has increased in parallel with the increasing demand. So, the total amount of investment in the first nine months of the year in Turkey took place as 2.2 billion USD. KPMG Turkey Mergers and Acquisitions Consulting Leader Gökhan Kaçmaz said that the pandemic period in the second quarter of 2020 has been active. Stating that the interest in mobile games and digital entertainment platforms increased significantly, Kaçmaz said: “With the increasing interest in digital, the interest of investors turned to technology companies. We can say that in 2020, in the startup ecosystem in Turkey as well as the processes of merger and acquisition activities, technology companies will have the largest share in the volume and the number of transactions.” Main transactions in the report are as the following:

• The largest transaction in the first three quarters of the year was the USA-based Zynga’s acquisition of the Turkish company Peak Games in June for 1.8 billion USD. Peak Games, with a value of over 1 billion was Turkey’s first ‘unicorn’ company.
• The second largest transaction that took place in the same period was Zynga’s acquisition of the Turkish company Rollic Games in August for 168 million USD.
• Another large transaction of 2020 came from the financial technology industry. The sale of Payguru to Tpay, one of the largest mobile payment companies in the Middle East and Africa region, was the outstanding transaction of the year.
• The investments made to WeWALK, the smart cane manufacturer for the visually impaired, operating in the field of health and biotechnology, Digime3D, 3D digital body scanning initiative, PepApp, women’s health monitoring and analysis application, Nanomik, which aims to increase the shelf life of food with microbial bio-peptide production and Virasoft, which is active in the field of digital pathology also drew attention.
• In the first quarter of 2020, startups received a total investment of 19 million USD based on the investments announced with 30 transactions, the investment amount in this second quarter was 28.3 million USD with 27 transactions and in the third quarter, 45.8 million USD investment was received with 44 transactions.
• Considering startup share sales, a total of 3 transactions with undisclosed value were realized in the first quarter, while this transaction volume was 1831.6 billion USD with the effect of Peak sales as well as 5 transactions in the second quarter and a transaction volume was 301.9 million USD with 10 transactions in the third quarter.
• With 8 transactions in the first three quarters and a transaction volume of approximately 2 billion USD, the game industry became the star of 2020 as the leading sub-sector.