Bora Can Yıldız, the Board Member of ISGID is on the Business Review Bulletin with his Success Stories

Bora Can YILDIZ, the Board Member of ISGID, told his success stories for the academic-popular bulletin Business Review.

Success Story of EID

Bora Can Yıldız is the owner of the EID construction company. The company runs great projects in Iraq particularly. Apart from that, he is interested in the new media lately. Bora Can Yıldız told the EID’s success story.

With the guidance of my family I have gained experience in all sectors since my childhood. When I was studying in Kadıköy Anatolian High School, I also worked during the summer season.  Although my family was financially in good shape, I gained experience in all kinds of sectors from sales clerkship to the lowest positions in the construction sector. I always tried to broaden my horizon, and aimed at advancing the construction business of my family in those years. At those times, it was really hard for me to work under the sun as a child; however, I have reaped the benefit of these experiences in the following years greatly.

I always thought that there was a great difference between my and my father’s era, and I tried to shape my life accordingly. As I had the opportunity to study abroad, I had chance to contact with the international companies there. I was quite interested in new technologies, and also in the growing technology markets. While I was studying civil engineering in Istanbul Technical University, I made some investments in the field of technology. During my visits to foreign countries, I witnessed many initiatives such as special computer programs, new computer systems, or digital productions which have been the main channel of the last decade, and 3D animations etc. Even when these were not on the agenda of Turkey, I predicted that these systems would go further, and therefore I never lost my excitement to invest in such fields. The company I established with the name Intro Group is now a leading company operating in the sector. It has become a company exporting digital production and software from Turkey to America and Europe in certain fields. Penetrating into medical sector which is quite special and niche market, we started to work with the medical key player in Turkey. We made animation movies showing the effects caused by a drug in the human body for the first time in Turkey. Having produced 300 movies for Turkey in a short time, we started to have requests from the foreign companies thanks to the international medical key player that shared these movies with them. We became the producer of the advertisement companies in “Madmen” TV show which is about the advertisement sector in 1960s, and we started to export to USA.

Adapting Gucci’s marketing strategy to Turkey; we gained a great market share with the quality digital productions. Having sold more than a thousand productions, we ensured the entrance of a great amount of foreign currency into our country, and we also paved the way for additional initiatives.

After we had learned that there is a new marketing channel called CLM (Closed Loop Marketing) in Europe and America, and that CLM is a system that advertises through tablet PCs and iPads; however, analyzes the customer behaviors at the same time, and changes the presentation in accordance with the needs of the customers, and also records the customer behaviors, and determines their tendencies, changes and improves the marketing strategy with the analyses, we noticed that this system actually had a great future, and decided to invest in this sector by relying on our experience and never-ending innovative approach as well as our customer in America. This way, once again we managed to be the market leader in this field in Turkey. The license for the majority of the digital introductions that are run through iPad belongs to us at the moment. It is possible for you to see these products in Apple Store, intPad, or intCLM.

While carrying out digital productions, we noticed that our customers were also spending a lot on the stands. One of my closest and reliable friends was sort of engaged in the stand production. His family was also involved in the business world; however, he wanted to stand on his own feet and do something. So, I offered him partnership, and we decided to produce stands for the medical sector. We were already carrying out digital production of such companies, why would not we make their stands as well? We established a stand department; and then this department has become a separate company in time. We increased our market share in the same sector, and when we planned all these, we were still at the university.

Thereafter, we combined the skills of both companies, because we were designing an producing on one side, and then carrying out the digital production thereof on the other side. After we had though that these could be used in the museums, we took the necessary steps in that direction. We built the interior of a museum of 36 thousand square meters in Kazakhstan from A to Z. This made a great impression. Thereafter, the companies building museums in England and America started to work with us on the contents of the museums. In addition to Nusret Minelayer and Cyprus Museums, we also started to build museums in Turkey such as the PTT museum that will be opened soon. Combining different disciplines, and predicting the future, also stepping in the areas where nobody could enter, we achieved a great growth for our company.

I did not leave the construction sector which is a family tradition for me.

The Middle East Adventure...

After we had seen countries such as Libya, Algeria, Qatar, Kuwait and Egypt and evaluated the opportunities there, we noticed that the greatest opportunity was in the southern part of Iraq, and then we started our operations. We have been operating in that region for the last three years.

Why Middle East?

If you ask me why we chose Middle East; we believed that it had potential even when nobody could dare to go there, or people were being kidnapped, and that we had to bring services there in this sense.

Keeping our promises we earned the trust of people with our operations. We achieved to be the only company operating there for two years during 2010 – 2011 despite of all the obstacles. This way, we set an example for other companies. I believe that there are two important capitals in this life; first one is the trust of people, and the second one is my personnel. We put our faith in them there.

Our previous international and national operations constituted important references for our future businesses. The fact that we left our high standards of living we had in Istanbul behind, and went there despite of all the difficulties, and put a struggle there made the local people greatly happy, because we took the projects in times when everyone was turning their back on them. We earned the trust of local people as well as the American and Italian companies. Although we suffered from great losses in the first years, we did not give up and tried to keep our promises even if we had to use our own resources. Thereby, we started to have a say in the major projects there in a short time.

Right now, we are engaged in the construction of four hospitals as well as a hotel there. We completed the construction of an airport. We are in the construction phase of various dwellings and business centers.  We also have construction projects to take a start soon such as industrial facilities, petroleum tanks and pipelines.

Bora Can YILDIZ

Chairman of the Board of EID and

Founding Member of ISGID Executive Board

Related Turkish Media Link:
http://www.isgid.org.tr/index.php?is=haberler&sayfa=haber-detay&id=74