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Published on December 29th, 2022 | by SayginYalcin

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Setting up a thriving e-commerce model, the Dubai way

Saygin Yalcin is the Founder and CEO of SellAnyCar.com and Carnab.com, both headquartered in Dubai.

After studying business in Germany, Mexico, and the US, he saw an opportunity in the UAE’s e-commerce space and moved to Dubai when he was 24 years old.

“The internet penetration rates were exploding, people were coming online… however, they were not transacting as we know it today”, Saygin recalls.

He started an online fashion store in 2009 called Sukar.com, which got acquired by Souq.com, which was then bought by Amazon. However, he wasn’t content with just one successful venture in Dubai, he wanted to dig deeper, “I believe that there are two types of entrepreneurs; one that digs out the raw diamond and another one that makes it into jewelry. I like digging for new business models”, he told Euronews.

When Saygin was trying to sell his car on the classifieds, he noticed that the process could take weeks and decided to research business models developed to address this issue.

“Building businesses does not necessarily mean that you have to be an inventor, you just have to be the best implementor of a model which might work on the other parts of the world”, Saygin says.

And that was exactly what Saygin did when he started SellAnyCar.com which offered to purchase any seller’s car in 30 minutes, for a fair price.

“SellAnyCar.com was a surprising success story from the first month onwards. Our first month’s revenue exceeded 470,000 euros,” says Saygin.

This rapid success brought its own challenges, as Saygin had to find a way to cover the working capital the business needed, to sustain the period between the time a car was purchased and resold.

“My team members, while buying a car, were already calling car dealers to check how much they would buy that car for. So, I realised they were doing some kind of an auction”, he adds.

The team took this idea further and developed a digital marketplace where today over twenty-five thousand companies are bidding on a car brought to SellAnyCar.com, which is now the largest used car trader online in the GCC.

As a serial entrepreneur, Saygin also recently launched Carnab.com which sells used cars online directly to consumers. “Today only 1% of used cars are sold online. We believe that number will be 50% in the next 5 to 10 years, and that’s when we will use our pole position”, he explains.

Believing the eco-system in Dubai significantly contributed to the success of his businesses, Saygin is now investing into the achievements of other entrepreneurs in the city.

“I love seeing companies grow, so I want to be a part of that as an investor, especially in the beginning when entrepreneurs are just digging out that raw diamond”, he says.

Source: Gorkem Sifael, Euronews

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About the Author

Saygin is the Founder & CEO of the Middle East's (ME) first & largest car buying service, SellAnyCar.com and Founder of the first & largest online private shopping club in the ME, Sukar.com, which has been acquired by Souq.com, making him Partner at the Souq.com and Jabbar Internet Group, becoming the largest ecommerce company in the Arab world, with 3000+ employees. In its largest acquisition outside the US to date, Amazon.com has acquired Souq.com Group. He has been selected as a UBS Industry Leader, a network of Ultra-High-Net-Worth Individuals. He was also Advisory Board Member & Academic Lecturer of Entrepreneurship at the Canadian University of Dubai. He was referred to as "the region's online business guru" by the National newspaper in the UAE, while Arabian Business named him as "one of the region's finest young entrepreneurs and a major part of the entrepreneurial scene in recent years". Fortune magazine (mag) named him in the 40 under 40 list, as one of the most influential young people in business, Entrepreneur mag ME awarded SellAnyCar.com, with Saygin at its helm, as the "Fastest Growing Company in the ME", while the National newspaper sees it among a handful of tech companies to "have the potential to break the $1bn barrier". In a cover story, Entrepreneur mag ME titled him as "undoubtedly one of the youngest & most successful internet entrepreneurs in the ME”, awarded SellAnyCar.com as "Technology Innovator of the Year”, while Khaleej Times awarded him as the Technology Leader. Gulf Business selected him as 1 of the Top 10 Entrepreneurs in ME. In a cover story, Arabian Business counts him as 1 of the most successful entrepreneurs to call Dubai home. During the World Government Summit, HH Sheikh Saif Bin Zayed, Minister of Interior of the UAE, presented Saygin as an inspiring story for the country, in the presence of world leaders, incl. HH Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum.



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