‘Teargassed in Turkey but got the deal done’ - QBS makes third strike in the market with Elmer Yazılım

The VAD adds over 100 vendors to QBS’ platform

When Dave Stevinson stepped off the plane to Istanbul a week ago, he hardly expected to get caught up in the middle of protests in the Turkish metropolis.

But even as anti-corruption demonstrations gathered momentum mere streets away, the QBS CEO accomplished what he set out to do.

In a move aimed at bolstering its presence in the META region, QBS Technology Group has completed the acquisition of Istanbul-based enterprise software distributor Elmer Yazılım Danışmanlık.

The distribution firm’s strategy is to tap into emerging markets, particularly across the Middle East, Turkey and Africa and this is its third Turkish buyout to date.

CRN caught up with QBS chairman Dave Stevinson, who was in Istanbul amid anti-government protests there, and joked: “Teargassed in Turkey, but still got the deal done.”

Stevinson stood by the choice of market, saying: “Turkey is a rapidly growing market with a high consumption of software, driven by large enterprises, financial institutions and central government procurement.”

QBS purchased InfoNet Bilgi Teknolojileri in May 2023 and went on to buy Prianto Turkey in February 2025 as part of a global deal with the rival distie.

This latest purchase follows along the same lines of building a Turkish software delivery platform with almost 1,000 resellers across the region, according to QBS.

QBS’ international expansion has also focused on South Africa with its recent acquisition of Titus.

The expanded platform now includes key vendors such as Check Point, OpenText, Trend Micro, Quest, Suse, JetBrains, Teamviewer & Dev Express.

The Istanbul-based VAD boasts over 1,500 vendors on its platform and serves clients across Turkey, the Middle East, Africa and parts of Asia.

“We are strategically taking our software delivery platform internationally and helping the world’s largest companies procure their complete software estate through their partners of choice,” Stevinson told CRN.

A homegrown success, the business was established in 1998 by Oguz Ulker and three classmates from the electrical engineering department of ODTU, Middle East Technical University.

Since then, the company has grown its client base to over 100 reselling partners.

Elmer will work closely with QBS Software UK and an integration team will synchronise the platforms in order to offer the client base of Elmer the entire 12,000 software vendors available via QBS within 90 days.

As part of the integration, the team will grow headcount with new roles in channel management, software testing and partner success.

“I have spent my lifetime building Elmer into the largest dedicated enterprise software distributor in Turkey and steadily expanded across the Middle East, Africa and Asia delivering software from hundreds of publisher,” said Oguz Ulker.

“It is so pleasing to join forces with Dave and his team at QBS who do exactly the same as we do but on a much larger scale. I look forward to helping him take it to the billion dollars and beyond.

“Working closely with Dave and Andreea. I look forward to transitioning into a leadership role in the QBS Turkey group of companies. We now have the platform, capital and increased ambition to grow even faster,” added Meric Ulker, META sales channel leader for enterprise software at Elmer.