The entrepreneurs recognised by this year's Maserati 100 in The Sunday Times are essentially innovators - from start ups and beginners to founders who have scaled heights of the FTSE 100 and 250. The list has been first time open to public nominations and innovation has been the key focus (The People's Choice). As times change, many are frustrated that people don't view innovation as part of the bigger picture. Natalie Turner, author of Yes, You Can Innovate, a practical guide said, “We have got to demystify innovation. It is not just about being creative. It's actually about being really good at spotting opportunities that are ripe and ready, and getting the right investment and getting good implementers. People need to realise that they can contribute to making ideas work.”
The Maserati 100 is now its third year, and is dedicated to celebrating the positive impact entrepreneurs have on the economy and society as a whole.
There are around 12 Asian-origin entrepreneurs named out of 100 and we have reproduced their details as below:
MANOJ BADALE AND CHARLES MINDENHALL, Bleinheim Chalcot
50 year old Badale and Mindenhall, 46 have been building digital ventures for 20 years. Part- private equity firm and part incubator, London based Bleinheim Chalcot has invested in 40 companies.
CAROLE KANE AND MAHMUD KAMANI, Boohoo.com
Kamani, 53 and Kane, 51 sell own label fast fashion to online shoppers typically under 25. They flaoted the Manchester based in 2014, and sales last year topped £280mn.
NISHA KATONA, Mowgli
After two decades a a barrister, 36 year old Katona set up Mowgli, a chain of Indian street food restaurants in Liverpool four years ago. It has 5 restaurants already, with 6th opening in Leeds later this year.
RISHI KHOSLA AND JOEL PERLMAN, OakNorth Bank
42 year old Khosla and Perlman who is 43, set up their London based bank to provide loans of between £500,000 and £25mn to fast groing businesses. The pair are frugal with costs, and made pre-tax profits of £10.6mn in its second year, with a loan of £850mn.
HERMAN NARULA, Improbable
30 year old, Computer game obsessive Narula founded his virtual world venture with a friend from Cambridge in 2012. Improbable, which created platform for simulations for ganes developers, raised $500m from SoftBank last May, making it a $1bn-valued “unicorn”.
JOSH RATHOUR, Unidays
35 year old Rathour started his Nottingham based online identification company in 2011, to help brands offer specific discounts for students. A year later, he teamed up with fashion retailer Asos and today he has links with brands like Apple and Nike. Unidays has 10m students signed up.
GORDON SANGHERA, Oxford Nanopore
Sanghera, 57, founded Oxford Nanopore after a successful career at Medisense. The Cambridge graduate transformed the idea born out of an Oxford laboratory into a handheld device used across the world to sequence genes in minutes.
MANDEEP SINGH AND ALEX LOIZOU, Trouva
34 year old Singh and Loizou, 30 created an online marketplace that promotes and delivers goods from more than 350 independent boutiques across Britain. It lists more than 75,000 products and raised £7.6mn last year.
SANJAY VADERA, The Fragrance Shop
50 year old Manchester based Vadera bought the Frangrance Shop in 2006 and has defied high street gloom to turn it into UK's biggest independent perfume retailer, with more than 200 stores and £112m sales last year.
AZMAT YUSUF, Citymapper
38 year old Pakistan born Yusuf, developed an app to calculate the most efficient routes for commuters by public transport using up-to-the-minute data. The London based company has raised $50mn and today 20mn commuters in 39 cities around the world use it.
THE PEOPLE'S CHOICE
ABBAS KAZMI, Collegiate Capital
26 year old former BlackRock asset manager Kazmi, left it to join the world of venture capitalism. His London company has raised £70mn and invests in financial technology, cyber-security and energy start ups. It has a team of more than 100 mentors, and is linked with 37 universities worldwide.
ANIL STOCKER, MarketInvoice
34 year old Stocker has provided funding worth £2bn to more than 5000 small businesses and turns over £5mn. The peer-to-peer lender, based in London has dragged invoice finance, where cash in advanced against an order book, into the digital world.
