With competition from deep-pocketed foreign players like Poland’s Audioteka and Sweden’s Storytel it’s a remarkable achievement. Remarkable enough to attract over a half million euros in new seed funding, aimed at further expansion both in Turkey and abroad.

Comparative numbers aren’t readily available to verify Dinlebi’s claim to be Turkey’s largest audiobook operation, just one year after launch, but we do know Dinlebi had 500,000 subscribers and a 2,000 title catalogue as it marked its first anniversary in September 2021.

With competition from deep-pocketed foreign players like Poland’s Audioteka and Sweden’s Storytel it’s a remarkable achievement.

Remarkable enough to attract over a half million euros – $577,000 – in new seed funding, aimed at further expansion both at home and abroad.

Dinlebi co-founder Ahmet Yaman, Dinlebi said in a press release that,

thousands of new German and English audiobook titles will soon become available on Dinlebi.

Having embarked on this journey with customer satisfaction as our primary emphasis, we will continue to rapidly expand our global reach with new content, new countries and unmatched service.

Dinlebi first stepped outside the Turkish border in March of this year with a deal with Germany’s Telefonica/Ay Yıldız GSM. It’s not clear what other countries Dinlebi is hoping to reach, but clearly the intent is there.

Polish rival Audioteka, which launched in Turkey in 2019, has deals with n11.com, Cafe Nero and Samsung to ensure its reach within Turkey

While Audible looks the other way, locked into Amazon’s roadmap, Poland’s Audioteka joins Storytel in Turkey, partners with Caffe Nero

while Storytel’s Turkey partners include Vodafone.

Storytel Turkey partners with Vodafone in latest telco deal to boost audiobook reach

Storytel launched in Turkey in May 2018 as Storytel’s twelfth market, with just 300 Turkish audiobooks in the catalogue. That came about after Storytel acquired the Turkish audiobook operator Seslenen Kitap, then Turkey’s biggest audiobook producer, in October 2017.

In 2019 Storytel saw a 315% rise in audiobook consumption in Turkey –

Storytel Turkey saw a 315% rise in audiobook consumption in 2019. Aims to grow 50% in 2020

and this year Storytel announced Turkey to be its fastest-growing market.

Turkey the fastest-growing of Storytel’s 25 markets, up 112% in 2020. But can Storytel global revenue keep up with expectations?

Despite a 40% increase in audiobook consumption in Turkey during the Pandemic the format is estimated to be only 1% of Turkey’s book market, but we can expect that to grow rapidly as more titles are added to the various operators’ catalogues.