Distributorship Agreements Under Turkish Law

I. Legal Standing of Distributorship Agreements

Distributorship agreements  do not have a clear definition under Turkish law and are therefore a complex and unique type of agreement. They can be generally defined as agreements allowing for the distribution of produced goods to customers and end users, where the manufacturer of a specific good agrees with a third party to distribute the said products/goods in a specific region. However, a distribution agreement differs from a standard purchase/sales agreement as the distributor's role is not limited to simply purchasing the products from the manufacturer and selling them to customers or end-users. Instead, in a distribution agreement the distributor is actually incorporated into the distribution chain of the supplier/manufacturer, while conducting transactions on its own behalf (and therefore is not a representative of the manufacturer).