Talya Bilişim especially focuses on the tourism and healthcare sectors. Their Elektra Hotel Management System is used in over 5,000 hotels. Nilüfer Durukal, the Co-Founder of Talya Bilişim Inc., states that their software, developed 100% by Turkish engineers, is used across 3 continents in 20 countries. In today’s rapidly evolving technological world, all processes are moving to digital platforms, making business operations easier and faster. Talya Bilişim anticipated this acceleration, especially during the pandemic, and focused on projects in the tourism and healthcare sectors.
The Elektra Hotel Management System, a leader in tourism technologies, has its web-based version currently used in more than 5,000 hotels. In the healthcare sector, their MEDISOFT Hospital Information Management System is used by more than 220 private healthcare institutions both domestically and internationally. The company also provides solutions with their KİMLİKOKUR identity and passport reading system, ISAFE Internet Security and Logging System, and OPEX Operations Management System.
With their software products, they aim to enable users to monitor financial, operational, and administrative processes electronically in detail, providing management with fast decision-making through accurate analysis and full control.
We spoke with Nilüfer Durukal, Co-Founder of Talya Bilişim Inc., about the company and its activities.
Can you tell us about the origin story of Talya Bilişim?
In the late 1990s, in a tourism-driven country like Turkey, there was a significant lack of professional tools to manage facilities, and existing solutions were not technology-driven. Talya Bilişim was born out of the recognition of this crucial need. I was already discussing potential ideas with one of my current partners about what could be done. Positive feedback from the sector pushed us to develop solutions first for tourism, then healthcare, shaping the market. This has been a 27-year journey of discovery. As of 2022, our software, developed 100% by Turkish engineers, is used on 3 continents in 20 countries. I take great pride in sharing this everywhere.
What kind of work do you carry out?
Talya Bilişim focuses primarily on the tourism and healthcare sectors. ELEKTRA Hotel Management System, a leader in tourism technologies, is currently used in more than 5,000 hotels thanks to its high-performance web-based version. In healthcare, we offer solutions through the MEDISOFT Hospital Information Management System, which is used by over 220 private healthcare institutions domestically and internationally, ranking among the sector’s top brands. Additionally, we continue to offer solutions to users with our KİMLİKOKUR identity and passport reading system, ISAFE Internet Security and Logging System, and OPEX Operations Management System. Our aim with these software products is to allow our users to closely monitor financial, operational, and administrative processes electronically, enabling rapid decision-making with accurate analyses and complete control.
What was your revenue in 2021 and what are your targets for 2022?
Half of 2021 was impacted by the pandemic, but afterwards, especially on the web side, our user numbers increased rapidly. We base our revenue target on 2019 figures and aim to exceed 2019’s revenue by 40% in foreign currency terms. I am happy to say we achieved our goal in the first quarter.
What products are you offering this year?
As Talya Bilişim, with our newly developed "elektrahotels.com Agent Platform," we have created an important advantage for the sector by connecting hotels and agencies online. With elektrahotels, agencies can directly connect to hotels to see real-time availability, prices, and quickly make reservations at the net agency prices set by the hotels. Elektrahotels.com, which offers time-saving, convenience, efficiency, and advantages to the tourism sector, is currently used by about 1,280 hotels across Turkey and around 100 hotels globally.
As the Elektraweb Hotel Program, starting from 2022, we offer seven essential online sales functions to all hotels free of charge. Along with channel management, online booking page, and virtual POS integration, we also provide Google integration, tour operator connections, online payment, and the agency connection function I just mentioned via elektrahotels.com.
Another important point for us in 2022 is that all accommodation establishments in Turkey must switch to e-invoice application by July 1st, by law. We prepared the most advantageous packages for our users during this initial stage of digital transformation. In some of our packages, we offer e-invoice connectors free of charge and also provide gifts of up to 5,000 credits.
What are your goals for the upcoming period?
Our primary goal in tourism is to complete the digital transformation of 2,000 hotels by the end of this year. By digital transformation, we mean fully managing operations digitally from end to end. This is both a psychological and an economic target for us. Longer term, we aim to make all our solutions fully web-based, repeating the success we achieved with Elektraweb for Medisoft and other products. We will focus more on healthcare tourism, which has become a significant revenue source for our country. We completed the infrastructure a long time ago and are now progressing to become a major player in the market.
What are your international goals?
We aim to be more active abroad with Elektraweb. Currently, Elektra is used in nearly 90 hotels in Azerbaijan. We have new distributors in Macedonia, Romania, Dubai, Egypt, Pakistan, Belgium, Nigeria, Bulgaria, Morocco, and Ivory Coast. More than 100 facilities abroad have already switched to Elektraweb. We target growth through one distributor per country. Our priority markets remain Africa and the Balkans. Of course, we are also interested in the US and European markets, which have the largest hotel pools in the world.
