One discipline: governance, applied to companies, markets, and projects, with growth and impact in mind.
Phaida Ventures OÜ is an Estonia registered independent advisory firm working across board governance, growth and M&A, impact and sustainable investing, and board level AI oversight, for companies, institutions, and multilateral organisations. It was founded in 2018 by Didem Gordon.
Phaida takes its name from the Turkish word fayda: to be of benefit, of use, of value to others.
That principle predates the current sustainability and AI debates and it defines every engagement. It is also why some of the firm’s work is pro bono, taken on because the mandate mattered rather than because it paid. Some of that work carries no fee and no announcement.
Phaida is one firm that operates in three distinct registers, and it is useful to be clear about which is which.
Phaida the firm
Holds mandates, delivers projects, convenes expertise, and engages as a UN stakeholder. It speaks to corporates, NGOs, public bodies, and international financial institutions.
Phaida the network
A node in a wider ecosystem. Sometimes it leads an engagement, sometimes it joins one. It works with consultants, institutions, committees, public bodies, NGOs, and academia.
Didem the practitioner
Non executive director, chair of audit, corporate governance, and risk committees focused on early risk detection, and speaker. She speaks to nomination committees, universities, and multilateral bodies.
A network, deliberately, rather than a fixed team.
The firm is deliberately small, and the work is built team by team from a network held over a long career.
This is a choice, not a constraint. Being brought in by others is a stronger signal than any claim a firm can make about itself. The role is to contribute depth where it is genuinely useful.
Registered in Estonia, part of the European Union.
The firm operates from Istanbul, with a global reach at the same time.
