Naspers' PayU buys Turkish payments provider iyzico in fintech push
Global fintech company PayU has acquired iyzico for $165 million, but the deal is expected to close only in the next few months.
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Naspers' PayU on Tuesday announced it has acquired Turkish digital payment services startup iyzico for $165 million. The deal, which needs approval from the regulators, is expected to close in a few months.
According to press statement, PayU has already deployed over $500 million across fintech investments and mergers and acquisitions.
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Despite ecommerce in Turkey achieving a stable growth of 10 percent every year, it is still considered to be in infancy stage with less than five percent share in total sales. The small and medium businesses (SMBs) in Turkey is expected to rise ten times in the next few years, and currently only five percent of SMBs have online sale presence, the company said.
After seeing the growth opportunity for ecommerce and online payments, the company hopes to improve scale and efficiency in Turkey with the acquisition. Moreover, the government’s programmes for digitisation may also help push the ecommerce marketplace.
Speaking on the occasion, Barbaros Özbuğutu, Co-founder and CEO, iyzico said,
“We founded iyzico with the goal to enable SMBs all over Turkey to accept online payments, an endeavor that turned into a team of 150 and billion Turkish liras of transaction volume. And today, we join forces with PayU, a leading global fintech operator and investor.”
Founded in 2013, iyzico is now present in 300 marketplaces and has 30,000 online merchants. Apart from local merchants, iyzico has partnered with international brands including Amazon, Nike, H&M, and Zara.
Commenting on the acquisition, Laurent le Moal, CEO of PayU said,
“PayU has acquired iyzico in a landmark move to deliver on our mission of local consolidation and becoming the number one payments provider in every high growth market we operate in.”
PayU will be able to create an ‘online bridge’ that will connect Turkey, central and eastern European countries, and Africa to increase trading in local currencies in the region, PayU said in a statement.
