Turkish firm introduces a user-friendly data tool
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by Reeta Paakkinen
Oluşturulma Tarihi: Mayıs 09, 2009 00:00
ISTANBUL - Turkey Data Monitor, providing economic data on Turkey in 170 data tables, is taking advantage of a growing need as the Turkish economy integrates with the globe. The founding partners spent three years to develop the system
Turkey Data Monitor, an Istanbul-based economic data firm, expects the number of its users to increase by 40 percent over the remaining seven months of 2009. Launched five months ago, the server’s database services provide macroeconomic data on Turkey in 170 data tables, with annual membership costing $400 a year.
Murat Üçer, managing partner of the firm, said the idea for Turkey Data Monitor matured while he was providing macroeconomic political advisory services through his consultancy firm, Global Source Turkey. "The consultancy work involved a lot of statistics - economic consulting and report writing overlap with data vendor services. It took us some three years to develop the database but the only actual investment we made in it was that of human capital," he told Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review in an interview last week.
Üçer is an economist with 15 years of expertise in macroeconomic and financial analysis. He returned to Turkey in 2001 after working at the International Monetary Fund for six years, contributing to financial programming and fiscal and budget analysis. He also worked at the Institute of International Finance in Washington, D.C., and has a doctorate in economics from Boston College.
Turkey Data Monitor is keen to expand its membership, particularly among academics and the finance sector. The firm’s database services currently have some 150 users among economics departments, academics, finance firms, think tanks and government institutions. The main challenge in promoting database services in Turkey is the set habits of potential users, Üçer said. "It takes certain learning for any new software to become established in any given market. Market penetration is challenging."
"Our goal is to make finding basic economic indicators and statistics on Turkey easy and accessible. The difference in our server is that it is very detailed on Turkey and goes beyond Excel Ğ we have already analyzed the data," Üçer said. Özlem Derici, project manager at the company, said they expect the system to bring noticeable efficiency increase in macroeconomic analysis. "Because the program eliminates data updating and saves a significant portion of time stolen from the thinking for more insightful analysis," she said. "This would make it an inevitable tool for economists who need to hire an assistant to deal with data or brokerage houses which should inevitably follow macroeconomic developments but have no economists or businesspeople who need to know overall economic performance of the country but are dependent to other people`s reports instead of directly accessing the correct information on their own."
Turkey Data Monitor is "basically a database," but it would be "unfair to say that it’s just a data pool," Derici continued. "Besides its main life-saving function of automatically updating data, there are several data-related and reporting-related analytical tools in it. Data-related utilities include, among others, making calculations such as changing frequency, changing currency, calculating percentage growth or real growth by one click. Some of the reporting-related tools include making summary tables, drawing charts, saving data in auto-updatable Excel files or an add-in presentation tool that combine your tables, charts and comments in slide format."
The firm expects to hire one more economist to its team during the remainder of 2009. "We also expect to launch version two of the platform by October this year," Üçer said.
Murat Üçer, managing partner of the firm, said the idea for Turkey Data Monitor matured while he was providing macroeconomic political advisory services through his consultancy firm, Global Source Turkey. "The consultancy work involved a lot of statistics - economic consulting and report writing overlap with data vendor services. It took us some three years to develop the database but the only actual investment we made in it was that of human capital," he told Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review in an interview last week.
Üçer is an economist with 15 years of expertise in macroeconomic and financial analysis. He returned to Turkey in 2001 after working at the International Monetary Fund for six years, contributing to financial programming and fiscal and budget analysis. He also worked at the Institute of International Finance in Washington, D.C., and has a doctorate in economics from Boston College.
Turkey Data Monitor is keen to expand its membership, particularly among academics and the finance sector. The firm’s database services currently have some 150 users among economics departments, academics, finance firms, think tanks and government institutions. The main challenge in promoting database services in Turkey is the set habits of potential users, Üçer said. "It takes certain learning for any new software to become established in any given market. Market penetration is challenging."
"Our goal is to make finding basic economic indicators and statistics on Turkey easy and accessible. The difference in our server is that it is very detailed on Turkey and goes beyond Excel Ğ we have already analyzed the data," Üçer said. Özlem Derici, project manager at the company, said they expect the system to bring noticeable efficiency increase in macroeconomic analysis. "Because the program eliminates data updating and saves a significant portion of time stolen from the thinking for more insightful analysis," she said. "This would make it an inevitable tool for economists who need to hire an assistant to deal with data or brokerage houses which should inevitably follow macroeconomic developments but have no economists or businesspeople who need to know overall economic performance of the country but are dependent to other people`s reports instead of directly accessing the correct information on their own."
Turkey Data Monitor is "basically a database," but it would be "unfair to say that it’s just a data pool," Derici continued. "Besides its main life-saving function of automatically updating data, there are several data-related and reporting-related analytical tools in it. Data-related utilities include, among others, making calculations such as changing frequency, changing currency, calculating percentage growth or real growth by one click. Some of the reporting-related tools include making summary tables, drawing charts, saving data in auto-updatable Excel files or an add-in presentation tool that combine your tables, charts and comments in slide format."
The firm expects to hire one more economist to its team during the remainder of 2009. "We also expect to launch version two of the platform by October this year," Üçer said.