For the latest episode of TRVC, I sat down with Tarık Dutkuner, who recently left e2vc to join Skybound Capital, a new European fund focused on deep tech.
I have been particularly interested in the shift toward deep tech lately because it raises an important question for our part of the world: what kinds of technology companies can Europe—and especially Turkey and Southeast Europe—actually have an advantage in building?
For much of the last decade, the venture playbook was dominated by software. Build quickly, keep capital requirements low, find product-market fit, and scale internationally. That model produced some remarkable companies, including in Turkey and Southeast Europe.
But something is changing.
AI is lowering the cost of building software, while geopolitics, energy security, defense, supply chains and technological sovereignty are pushing governments and investors to think much more seriously about the physical world again.
Energy. Robotics. Advanced materials. Space. Biotech. New manufacturing technologies.
In other words: deep tech.
Tarık and I spend a good part of this episode talking about why these companies require a different approach to venture investing. They can take longer. They often require more capital. The technical risk can be substantial. And evaluating a founder who is commercializing years of scientific research is very different from evaluating another SaaS company.
But the potential rewards—and the strategic importance—can also be enormous.
This is particularly relevant for Turkey and Southeast Europe.
The region has excellent engineers, strong technical universities, comparatively low development costs and, in certain industries, a surprisingly deep base of technical know-how. Turkey has already demonstrated how quickly an ecosystem can emerge once talent, capital, role models and ambition begin reinforcing one another. Gaming is perhaps the clearest example. Defense technology is another, albeit with a very different ecosystem and funding model.
So could something similar happen in deep tech?
That leads us into one of my favorite parts of the conversation: universities.
If Turkey wants to create more globally important deep tech companies, some of them will almost certainly have to come out of university laboratories. That means getting much better at turning research, intellectual property and highly specialized technical knowledge into companies that entrepreneurs and venture investors can actually build around.
We also talk about Tarık’s own journey—from private equity to e2vc and now Skybound—and what he has learned investing across Turkey and the broader region.
And, naturally, I asked him where he would place his bets.
Among the areas that come up are energy, space and nuclear technology, as well as the broader question of which sectors could produce Turkey’s next billion-dollar technology companies.
For anyone following venture capital and technology in Europe, Turkey or Southeast Europe, I think this is a particularly relevant conversation. It is not just about another new VC fund. It is about a potentially important change in what we consider a venture-backable technology company—and where the next generation of European technology champions might come from.
🎙️ TRVC #33 — From e2vc to Skybound: Building Europe’s Next Deep Tech Fund | Tarık Dutkuner
Watch the full conversation on YouTube, or listen on your preferred podcast platform.
Episode 33 also marks roughly one third of the journey towards my goal of 100 conversations with the investors and others building Turkey’s venture capital ecosystem.
And if you want to show your support, just hit reply and say “Hi!” That’s it. It may seem like a small thing, but it’s always great to hear from the people following along. Thank you to everyone who has sent me a short note so far.
33 down. 67 to go. See you at the next conversation.
Yunus