Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce (GBCC) are spearheading a drive to create more business with Turkey.
A delegation from the GBCC has been on a lightning visit to Bursa, about 100 miles from Istanbul and met businesses who are thirsting to establish business with UK SMEs.
This was made obvious with visit to several companies, including a textile giant and huge manufacturing plants.
Paul Faulkner, the GBCC’s chief executive, said: “This was an extremely productive and insightful trip. There is so much potential in Turkey and one that West Midlands companies must take a close look at.
“It is obvious that many UK companies are fearful of even getting into export markets, but they do need to understand that there is huge potential out there.
“And it may not be obvious, but there are many countries like Turkey that UK businesses do not take seriously as potential partners.
“To drive this new understanding, the Chamber has agreed to promote a huge Bursa International Summit beginning at the end of November which is being led by Bursa Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BTSO).
“This will be a great opportunity for inquisitive and ambitious businesses in Greater Birmingham to start to explore and develop relationships with Bursa firms, and BTSO have made it clear that they will welcome us back with open arms and do all they can to facilitate the opening up of new relationships.
“And there are easy links with Bursa via Istanbul with 12 direct flights a week with Turkish Airlines from Birmingham Airport. I urge anyone with any interest in joining us and attending to reach out as soon as possible.
Chamber Commerce membership in Turkey is compulsory and the BTSO demonstrated how effectively they can support their 40,000 members.
Cuneyt Sener, vice president of BTSO, said: “We really want to establish serious contact with UK companies and urge them to come here to see what we do.
“Bursa is a city of huge potential and we will shortly be opening a shopping centre in Moscow to sell goods from our region. We have plans to do similar exercises throughout the world.
“It is really important that UK companies come here and push themselves. They should tell us what they want from Bursa and we will be very happy to help them.”
The GBCC delegation included president Paul Kehoe, chief operating officer Russell Jeans and Professor Alex De Ruyter, Director of the Centre for Brexit Studies at Birmingham City University.
Mr Kehoe said: “Understanding this area is just an eye-opener and we need to spread the word on the success business out here are having. We need to be their allies.
“Between us we can provide links between Asia in the east through Bursa and through towards the west and the United States.”
Mr Jeans said: “We were all impressed with the tremendous enthusiasm here from businesses that have great synergies with the UK.
“The GBCC’s International Hub will be driving greater links with Turkey and Bursa in particular and we are happy to facilitate any company that wants to look at doing business there.”
The Birmingham delegation visited a textile manufacturing giant, Ilay Textile, who are planning to open a UK office to cope with a growing market here, currently running at 10 million dollars annually. Part of those sales is a yearly contract to supply Marks & Spencer with dress materials.
Durmazlar, established in 1987 as Turkey’s first sheet metal company now employing 1,500 people with lazar-cutting machines and the complete production of trams, largely for the city of Bursa but with world-wide ambitions.
Yepsan, an archetypical metal-bashing company that supplies components to Fiat, Bentley, VW, Audi and Volvo among others also have a huge defence and aviation division based in Turkey’s capital Ankara with customers like Boeing and Airbus. They also specialise in manufacturing helicopter simulators and seats
