“Microentrepreneur and Young Entrepreneurs” themed conference was organized by European University of Lefke (EUL) Faculty of Economics & Administrative Sciences Department of Business. T.R.N.C Ministry of Economy and Energy Small and Medium sized enterprises Promotion Center (KOBİGEM) Coordinator Ebru Kaptan Sertoğlu attended the conference as a speaker.

Sertoğlu started her speech with introducing KOBİGEM and stated that KOBIGEM is a center established on July 14, 2010 within the body of Ministry of Economy and Energy in order to carry out the studies on planning, development and planning of the projects within the scope of Small and Medium Enterprises in the TRNC. Sertoğlu pointed out the aim of KOBİGEM as; ensuring that small and medium sized enterprises and new entrepreneurs benefit from the science and technology infrastructure of universities and public and private research institutions, seeking solutions to the marketing problems of small and medium sized enterprises,  taking necessary measures for the development and dissemination of entrepreneurship culture and environment in the TRNC and supporting universities and other institutions / organizations and new entrepreneurs.

In her presentation, Sertoğlu talked about some successful entrepreneurship projects, especially from the programs for new entrepreneurs and gave information about the contributions of small and medium sized enterprises to the country’s economies and the issues that entrepreneurs have for the economy.

Sertoğlu said that there are some obstacles in the field of legal arrangements, financial issues, business environment issues and education and entrepreneurship orientation at the point of establishing a small or medium sized enterprise. Sertoğlu gave some recommendations for young entrepreneurs in order to overcome these obstacles such as; having logical business ideas, using their social networks effectively, rather than looking at events superficially, being open to new ideas, not being afraid of failure, and learning how to mobilize different funding sources when setting up an enterprise.

Giving information about supports of KOBİGEM to young entrepreneurial candidates, Sertoglu shared many examples of entrepreneurship that have been successfully conducted to date with the students and explained the relationship between the theoretical knowledge and the real business life through the experienced stories. The conference, which attracted a great deal of attention from EUL students who are potential young entrepreneur candidates in the future, ended with questions from students and other participants.