The size of the Turkish IT sector is 189 billion TL

TÜBİSAD announced the “Information and Communication Technologies Sector 2020 Market Data and Trends”. According to the report, the sector grew by 22% in TL terms compared to the previous year and reached a volume of 189 billion TL. The employment of the sector increased to 158 thousand people and the exports reached 10 billion 520 million TL. In the report, remote working and distance education, social distance in the physical world, virtual social life, the rise of e-commerce, strong M&A activities and Turkey’s first unicorn, increasing data usage and strong 2020 performance of telecom companies evaluated as main topics in the information and communication sector in Turkey.

According to the report, 5G and fiber internet, internet of things, smart edge computing, artificial intelligence, cyber security and data privacy technologies were evaluated as the technologies that stand out with both market growth expectation and adaptation and transformative impact on the sectors.

Global Information and Communication Market Size in 2020

According to the TÜBİSAD report, the global Information and Communications market size shrank by 2.2% in 2020 to 3.8 trillion USD, while the information technologies market size shrank by 0.2% and the communication technologies market size by 4.0%.

Future Expectations and Global Information and Communication Market Growth Forecast

After reaching 4.1 trillion USD with 8.4% growth in 2021, the size of the Global Information and Communications market is expected to reach 5.0 trillion USD in 2025 with an annual growth of 5.3%.

Prominent Developments in the Information and Communications Sector in Turkey

According to the data, the spread of teleworking and distance education in Turkey caused an increase in the demand for teleconferencing applications and remote working solutions, while the increase in data usage was reflected in the ICT sector. It was stated that the spread of remote working and distance education increased the demand for teleconferencing applications and remote working solutions such as cloud switchboard solutions for call centers in Turkey as well as in the world, and it was reflected in the information and communication sector as an increase in data usage.

While the need for social distance in the physical world and the virtualized social life changed consumer behaviors, they caused an increase in demand in different areas of the ICT sector. The concept of social distance and health monitoring, which has become mandatory, has affected the way companies do business, and also caused changes in consumer behavior. With the transfer of social life to the virtual environment, internet and data usage increased, while demand increased for certain categories.

In the report, it was stated that the rapid growth of e-commerce and online credit card payments is expected to support the expenditures in the hardware, software and services sectors in the information technology market.

While mobile and fixed broadband data usage increased by more than 50% in 2020, the revenues of the electronic communication sector increased by 16% and the investments of the sector increased by 30%.

Market Figures

In 2020, the market size reached 189.0 billion TL (26.9 billion USD). In the report, it was stated that the exchange rate effect and electronic communications contributed 12.3 and 10.4 billion TL, to the sector’s growth respectively. Between 2016 and 2020, the annual average growth of the sector on TL basis was 19%.

In the report, it was mentioned that Information Technologies grew faster than Communication Technologies between 2016-2020, but the increasing exchange rate had a negative impact on both Information Technologies and Communication Technologies sizes.

Origin of 2020 Products and Services

In the report, it was stated that the weight of domestic products is higher in the service and software categories within Information Technologies.

Domestic products in the Information Technologies-Service sector: 76%

Domestic products in the Information Technologies-Software sector: 71%

Export

The report revealed that the largest share in total exports is in the Information Technologies Software category. The total exports of the sector grew by an average of 10% annually in USD terms between 2016 and 2020. Although the total sector size decreased by around 1% in USD terms in 2020, the total exports of the sector increased by more than 30%. While a decrease was observed in the exports of the communication technologies group in 2020, the information technologies group provided the growth in exports. It was stated that the most important category supporting the increase was the growth in the Information Technologies Software category, which also has the largest share in exports.

Employment

The total employment of the sector reached 158,000 in 2020 with a growth of 7%. The rate of sector stakeholders who expect sector employment to increase in 2021 has increased compared to 2020.

Information technologies: 122 thousand

Communication technologies: 36 thousand

Areas of Influence of the Sector

In the report, it is stated that in 2021, digital transformation is expected by the participants to be the technological field that stands out in the sector.

The technological fields that will shape the sector in the next 5 years are expected to be artificial intelligence and cloud technology, as in 2019.

Covid-19 Impact

With the impact of COVID-19, the stakeholders participating in the survey invested in their technological infrastructure in 2020 and adapted to new ways of doing business with remote working within the scope of measures.

The rate of those who said “I have adapted/renewed my technological infrastructure” was 61% and the rate of those who said “I gained new customers” was 58%.

It was stated that the rate of those who said “We have switched to the remote working model for all employees” is 42%.