TTVNews celebrates its first 20 years, inviting friends and industry colleagues to share their personal experiences over the past two decades. Özkan İpek, founder of Yeşil Yapim / Haciyatmaz Group, answers “where were you 20 years ago?”

This 2024 marks the 20th anniversary of TTVNews, a big reason to celebrate for the group which is consolidating itself as one of the go-to media platforms in the audiovisual industry in Latin America.

And to mark the occasion, we’ve invited friends and colleagues to share their experiences, challenges and lessons learned over the last 20 years in this industry.

This time, Özkan İpek, founder of Yeşil Yapim / Haciyatmaz Group, answers “where were you 20 years ago?”

Where were you 20 years ago?

I was working in a distribution and production company, so we were buying TV rights of foreign movies for Turkish broadcasters. Plus, we decided that the distribution business was slowing down, so we had to do something new, which was starting a production arm for the company.

And we started producing a TV show called Ashkumuzda Umar, starting off by Kainarja, Ajay Uthu. They were very famous back then. They are still very famous. So that was what I was doing 20 years ago.

What was your first industry event?

Sure, it was Cannes Film Festival in 1996.