CEO Weekends: Naspers Fully Acquires Markafoni, Turkish E-commerce Site

Sam Wakoba

12 years ago

South African media conglomerate Naspers has acquired the remaining shares of Markafoni, a Turkish e-commerce firm making it the 100% owner of the firm.

This deal comes 3 years after Naspers bought nearly 2/3 of Markafoni at reportedly $200 million valuation, according to an earlier TechCrunch report.

According to CEO Sina Afra in a statement, “Today, Naspers announced to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Markafoni. Naspers originally acquired a majority stake of Markafoni in July 2011 in one of the biggest deals in the Turkish online industry. Now, 3 years later, Naspers decided to take full advantage of the phenomenal growth of the Turkish e-commerce market and leadership position of Markafoni.”

Founded in 2008, Markafoni was the first Turkish internet company going global (Australia, Ukraine, South Korea, Greece and Poland) according to Afra and it became the biggest Online Fashion company in Turkey and MENA with its variety of brands.

“I’ve lived and breathed Markafoni ever since I co-founded our company in 2008. I will leave Markafoni as of May 31, 2014 and head for new entrepreneurial endeavours,” said Afra on his departure.

Markafoni will be run by Ilker Baydar the current head of Naspers Group Turkey.

The South African giant has a 34% stake in China’s Tencent, a 29% stake in Russia’s Mail.ru Group, OLX and several other ventures in Africa, China, Russia, India, Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe.

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