TRVC - The Turkish VC podcast28 Touko 2025

TRVC11: Dilek Dayınlarlı From Istanbul to Silicon Valley: The ScaleX Vision

Yunus Çelebiler sits down with Dilek Dayınlarlı, Founding Partner of ScaleX Ventures, one of the first Turkish VC funds dedicated to helping enterprise software startups scale globally from day one.

With more than a decade in venture, Dilek has been an early backer of Turkish tech champions like Insider, İyzico, Picus Security, and DataRow, and has built a cross-border investment thesis that blends Silicon Valley scale with Turkish engineering excellence.

We dive deep into Dilek’s journey from engineering and telco to launching ScaleX, the lessons she’s learned building a venture firm during COVID, and why she believes Turkey is at an inflection point for producing global category leaders.

This is a must-listen for anyone interested in venture capital, Turkish startups, deep tech, or scaling from emerging markets to the U.S.👇

Chapters

00:00 – Introduction

01:00 – Dilek’s path into venture capital

04:00 – Early bets: İyzico, Insider...

07:30 – Why enterprise SaaS and global-first

10:00 – Silicon Valley & Kauffman Fellowship

13:00 – FoundingScaleX during COVID

16:30 – Talent: bridging Bay Area and Turkey

19:00 – Go-to-market, and dev tools strategy

22:00 – Fund value-add: founder networks

25:00 – Motivation and impact: creating wealth through tech

28:00 – Investing in deep tech and frontier founders

31:00 – Fund strategy and LP evolution from Fund 1 to Fund 2

35:00 – Turkish VC ecosystem today: challenges and opportunities

38:00 – Reflections on being a long-term, adaptive investor

41:00 – Book recommendations: The Power Law & Superforecasting

44:00 – Stock options and wealth creation in emerging markets

46:00 – Final thoughts & shout-outs

🔗 Follow for more conversations on the future of VC in Turkey and beyond.

Tämä jakso on lisätty Podme-palveluun avoimen RSS-syötteen kautta eikä se ole Podmen omaa tuotantoa. Siksi jakso saattaa sisältää mainontaa.

Jaksot(36)

Inside Turkey’s $Billion Gaming Boom | Görkem Türk, Laton Ventures (TRVC 36)

Görkem is unequivocal about this: Turkey has the biggest mobile gaming ecosystem in the world. In this episode of TRVC, I sit down with Görkem Türk, Founding Partner of Laton Ventures, to explore how ...

25 Syys 47min

Why Global Investors Are Coming to Istanbul | Şan Yalman, Istanbul Slush’d (TRVC 35)

Why are global investors paying more attention to Istanbul and Turkey’s startup ecosystem?In this episode of TRVC, I sit down with Şan Yalman, Investment Associate at Intera and co-founder of Istanbul...

9 Syys 36min

From Turkey to the US: Helping Founders Who Make the Leap | Didem Altop, Treeo VC (TRVC 34)

What does it take for a founder from Turkey — or elsewhere in the world — to make the leap into the US startup ecosystem?In this episode of TRVC, I speak with Didem Altop, General Partner at Treeo VC,...

27 Elo 48min

From e2vc to Skybound: Building a European Deep Tech Fund | Tarık Dutkuner | TRVC #33

My guest is Tarık Dutkuner, Partner at Skybound Capital, a new €40M venture fund investing in deep tech startups across Europe.Before joining Skybound, Tarık was an investor at e2vc, where he worked w...

12 Elo 33min

Hackquarters'tan Tenity'ye: Hızlandırıcı, Kurumsal İnovasyon ve VC | Kaan Akın - TRVC 32

Türkiye girişimcilik ekosisteminin tanınmış isimlerinden biri olan Kaan Akın bu bölümde TRVC'ye konuk oluyor.Kaan, Hackquarters'ı nasıl kurduğunu, kurumsal inovasyon programlarının nasıl ortaya çıktığ...

30 Heinä 47min

The Missing Piece in Deep Tech: Venture Financing - Serhat Çiçekoğlu (Sente Ventures) TRVC 31

Deep tech startups don't usually fail because the technology doesn't work—they fail because they can't finance their first factory.In this episode of TRVC – The Turkish VC Podcast, I speak with Serhat...

15 Heinä 36min

Daha Fazla Kadın, Daha Güçlü Bir Girişim Ekosistemi - Nihal Güngör (SistersLab) TRVC 30

Bu bölümde konuğum, SistersLab – Bilim ve Teknolojide Kadın Derneği'nin kurucu üyelerinden Nihal Güngör.Bu bölüm, TRVC'de alışık olduğumuz klasik girişim sermayesi veya startup kurucusu sohbetlerinden...

1 Heinä 25min

Why Most VCs Are Bad at Exits | Alex Konoplyasty (Flashpoint Capital) TRVC 29

Alex is the Founder and General Partner of Flashpoint Capital, a growth-stage VC and venture debt firm managing over $600 million. Before founding Flashpoint, he spent years in investment banking at M...

18 Kesä 49min