Ahmet Nazif Zorlu

Ahmet Nazif Zorlu (born February 1, 1946 in Babadağ , Denizli ) is a Turkish entrepreneur and, together with his brother Zeki Zorlu, board member of the Zorlu Holding group .

biography

In 1961 his father Hacı Mehmet Zorlu handed the company over to him and his older brother Zeki. He then moved to Trabzon to continue his career there. There he worked in the textile industry and sold blankets that his family produced in his hometown. He then founded a textile factory with his brother Zeki in Bursa , in which they produced home and household textiles.

In the 1990s, Zorlu began moving into other businesses such as energy and retail banking. Denizbank , a small bank acquired in 1997, has been transformed by the Zorlu family into one of the largest in the country; almost ten years later, in May 2006, it was acquired by Dexia for US $ 2,437 million .

In 1994 he and his brother took over the bankrupt Turkish television manufacturer Vestel . The Zorlu brothers had set up a textile business in southwest Turkey , but knew little about consumer electronics. Initially, with just 360,000 televisions a year, they produced a fraction of what their American and Japanese rivals did. Today Vestel sells $ 1.6 billion in products and manufactures 7.5 million televisions per year, as well as nearly five million other devices such as headphones and DVD players . In Europe, Vestel televisions are sold under the brand names of former competitors such as Sharp , Mitsubishi and Sanyo . Vestel is part of Zorlu Holding, a $ 4 billion conglomerate .

According to the business magazine Forbes , in 2008 Ahmet Nazif Zorlu was ranked 524th among the richest people in the world with a fortune of $ 2.3 billion and 5th in Turkey. In 2010 he was ranked 8th in the list of the richest Turks .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Biyografiler: Ahmet Nazif Zorlu (Turkish)
2. ↑ Ahmet Nazif Zorlu: Chairman, Zorlu Holdings, Turkey (English)
3. ↑ The World's Billionaires: # 524 Ahmet Nazif Zorlu (English)