Hello friends, dear readers,
yesterday was a historic day for me, my family and everyone who has supported me and our joint project “wee” for years. I was named Entrepreneur of the Year by the most important business and trade associations in the Munich Metropolitan Region! I am still overwhelmed, proud, grateful… I don’t know what to say. I could not be happier. Did I really deserve this award? I really don’t know.
I’m honest and I have to admit: There are probably better entrepreneurs, better companies… But there is no entrepreneur who fights for his vision and the project like I do. And there is no company – I say this out of the deepest conviction – with such motivated employees, partners in the sales networks, who go through fire for our common cause. People who have already gone through purgatory for us and are still burn with passion for our cause… Just like me. This motivates me. Day after day.
Yesterday a lot ran through my mind, while I was waiting excitedly like a schoolboy for my award on the stage of the Nockherberg, where the big players of politics and cabaret usually excite their audience. The ups and downs of the last years, many faces and people who have shaped and also changed me a bit. I bow to the trust you all have placed in me. I’ll repay each and every one of you. Promised! At the very back, in the VIP stand, I saw CSU icon Dr. Edmund Stoiber, elegant in a tuxedo, with his wife Karin. And I thought of the weeConvention in late 2017 when he
was key-note speaker in front of 4,000 and started with the words: “You have the nerve to do something!”
He was and still is right – we had the nerve. With a lot of courage, motivation, creativity, discipline, inventiveness and preservance, we will make the “wee”
brand shine. More and more! National, international, global! Promised!
Your
Cengiz Ehliz
Media release
Munich / Kreuzlingen, February 10th, 2019
Award ceremony on behalf of the fallen ill Minister President Markus Söder at the black and white ball on the Nockherberg
Munich Entrepreneur of the Year 2018: Cengiz Ehliz with “wee“
1,200 guests from politics as well as the administration, economy, science, culture and sports sector formed the festive setting at this year’s awards ceremony for the prestigious Entrepreneur Awards. Cengiz Ehliz (48), founder of “wee”, the innovative cashback / mobile payment system, was given the honour for the year 2018 at the ball highlight of the year “Münchner G’schichten” last night. As part of its European metropolis strategy, the company caused a sensation far beyond Munich in the summer and was topic of conversation for weeks. For the market entry in Munich was accompanied by a unique event in the Olympic Park Munich – the world’s most valuable sand mountain as an attraction for four weeks for locals and tourists. In the meantime, 2,400 stationary retailers have joined “wee” in the metropolitan region of Munich.
Tölz-born Ehliz, from Upper Bavaria with Turkish roots, son of a migrant worker familiy and today a globally active multi-entrepreneur in the M-Business, accepted the award full of joy by Josef Schmid (49), member of the state parliament. The former 2. Mayor of Munich was full of praise: “Digitalisation is an important item on the agenda of our Free State politics. Therefore, we can only welcome the digitalisation of the retail trade by “wee”.”
Boost for the retail trade
In the 2018 election, the most important regional economy and business associations have unanimously chosen the full-blooded entrepreneur with headquarters of his weeBusiness GmbH in Schwabing Park City. 86 permanent employees are currently working here, and about 30 % are highly qualified software experts. “I am very proud and immensely pleased,” Ehliz said during the ceremony, “my special thank you goes to everyone who believes in my vision of a single global card, a single retail app and to everyone who supported “wee” in recent years with their personal commitment.” His vision is also a challenge: “We are the innovative and loyal partner for stationary retail trade against E-commerce giants like Amazon!”
What makes “wee” stand out as a cashback and mobile payment system?
And what distinguishes “wee” from other loyalty programmes? What makes “wee” so unique? For starters – there are no bonus points with which to buy something that you often do not actually need. For example, if the customer makes a purchase in the wee.com portal at one of the more than 1,300 online shops – which include many renowned names – and receives discounts earned as “wee” (one “wee” = one euro), he can only use this when making a purchase with a stationary retailer or post it to his own current account. In this regard, “wee” is the ultimate partner, the turbocharger for the retail sector, which in many places is struggling to survive. At present, a good 30,000 points of acceptance are affiliated throughout Europe, and the aim for the next few years is to integrate a further one million retailers – free of charge for them – into the “wee” infrastructure, thus digitalising them in the process.
The sensational introductory campaign of “wee” in Munich under the motto “weeLoveMunich”, attracted 4,000 guests to the “weeIsland” event site. The “Klondike”, consisting of 2,500 tons of special sand, contained gold nuggets and charged weeCards with a total purchase value of 100,000 euros worth of shopping credits for the stationary retail trade.
The visionary thinks in interdisciplinary project steps
The pilot project weeArena – with the first open payment system worldwide – is currently up and running in Bad Tölz. And when the 2019/20 season kicks off, cashless payment via the weeApp or weeCard will also be possible in the ice stadium Deggendorf – with 25 further weeArenas planned across the world in the coming years. This also includes talks on mobile payment in the new multifunctional Olympic Park sports arena, where the EHC Red Bull Munich will host its home matches in the future. First steps have been achieved through the current sponsorship as a “Business Partner” in the cashback system area of the DEL-Club and Champions League finalists.
The global payment systems sees blockchain-based technologies as playing an increasingly pivotal role. “Wee” is currently working intensively on the transformation of the existing technical base and business model into blockchain.
Social commitment is a matter of course
Despite all the success that the self-made entrepreneur has achieved in recent years, his attention is always focused on those who are not on the sunny side of life. The charitable Munich-based weeCharity for Kids (registered association) helps sick children and children in need worldwide in an unbureaucratic way. The “volunteers”, under the leadership of Chairwoman Siana Petrova (43), life partner of initiator Ehliz, advise the parents personally in order to cover the costs of surgeries and treatments that are not paid for by statutory health insurance funds. For example, 10,000 euros were donated to the kbo children’s centre in Munich from the proceeds of the “gold digging” during the event in the Olympic Park. Accordingly, the family father’s life motto with daughter Aleyna (20) and son Constantin (5) applies: “What matters in life are not just the good deeds, rather what we leave behind for the world.”
Media contact:
weeConomy AG/weeBusiness GmbH, Media Spokesman/Public Relations, Tilmann Meuser
c/o CP/CONSULT Consulting Services GmbH
Tel.: +49 (0) 201 / 890699-15; Mobile: +49 (0) 177 / 8095117
meuser@cp-cs.de
