Tablet Seminerler

What did it do?

Tablet Seminerler was a Turkish education start-up designed by futurist Ufuk Tarhan and launched together with Emrah Kaya, founder of Youtholding. Seminars of up to three hours on topics such as digital marketing, social media, careers and lifestyle were sold through its website, while attendance took place in person in Istanbul after working hours or at weekends. Participants received a certificate, and seminar prices ranged from 69 to 99 TL.

Why did it shut down?

The platform began running courses in September 2013 and closed only five months later, in February 2014. In a statement to Hürriyet, investor Hasan Aslanoba gave the founders' other commitments and their inability to focus sufficiently on the project as the main reason for the failure. According to Aslanoba, the second problem was that the model never moved fully to online seminars; the burden of physical venues and organisation made customer acquisition harder. egirişim also reported that the information on the site stopped being updated after a while and that the courses were halted. The closure went on record as the first start-up to fail among the roughly 40 investments Aslanoba had made since December 2012.

The story

In 2013 Ufuk Tarhan, a futurist and founder of M-GEN, designed a new format for adult education. Named after medicine tablets, Tablet Seminerler promised to deliver practical knowledge about work and everyday life from the mouth of an expert, in short, concentrated doses. The project was developed under the umbrella of Youtholding, founded by Emrah Kaya. In March 2013 Webrazzi, the Turkish tech news site, announced that the start-up had received 500,000 TL in angel investment from Hasan Aslanoba, former CEO of Erikli Su. According to Hürriyet, Aslanoba took a 20 per cent stake in return.

The model was simple: users chose a seminar online and paid for it, attended a session of up to three hours held in Istanbul after work or at the weekend, and received a certificate of attendance at the end. Topics ranged from digital marketing to social media and from careers to lifestyle. According to Tarhan's introductory article in Martı Dergisi, seminar prices ranged from 69 to 99 TL; offering the seminars to companies as gifts or as a loyalty programme was also being considered.

The new office and e-commerce site opened in September 2013, with the first course scheduled for the last day of the month. The start-up, however, failed to gain momentum. According to egirişim, the content on the site stopped being updated after a while and the courses were halted. In February 2014 Hürriyet reported that Tablet Seminerler had closed within five months and that it was the first start-up among Aslanoba's investments to fail.

Aslanoba attributed the closure to two causes. The first was a lack of focus: the founders had other businesses too and could not give the project the energy it needed. Aslanoba summed this up with the words "Being a serial entrepreneur doesn't really work." The second was the model itself: in his view, the seminars would have stood a chance had they been moved to a fully online format, because the burden of physical venues and organisation had made customer acquisition harder.

Aslanoba said he remained open to investing in education but would from then on prefer start-ups that had gained a certain momentum and had regular customers. Tablet Seminerler remained one of the early examples, from the years when angel investment was gathering pace in Turkey, of how quickly a good idea can fizzle out without a full-time team.

Lessons for founders

• A start-up run as a side project will not grow, even with investment; full-time focus is essential.
• If you sell a product online and deliver it offline, work out the logistical burden from the start.
• In education, demand depends not only on price but also on ease of access.

Sources

1. Tablet Seminerler receives 500,000 TL in angel investment (Webrazzi, 2013-03-07)
2. Tablet Seminerler closes: one of Aslanoba's investments fails for the first time (Hürriyet, 2014-02-27)
3. Aslanoba's first failed investment and why: "Tablet Seminerler" (egirişim, 2014-05-04)
4. A new education model: Tablet Seminerler (Martı Dergisi, 2013-09-10)
5. 50 failed start-ups and 50 lessons from their mistakes (15-30) (Turkishtime, 2016-05-06)

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