GBA

Growing Businesses are what the future is all about, and I love to be a part of it.
Theo Paphitis, chairman, Ryman

Entrepreneur of the Year

The Entrepreneur of the Year is the biggest individual accolade at the Growing Business Awards, presented to a very special entrepreneur.

Judging this category: Andrew Haigh, Coutts & Co; Martin Leuw, Incube8lt; Helen Loveless, Financial Mail; Rob Wilmot, BCSAgency.

Shortlisted candidates:

Tony Goodwin spotted an opportunity for an international recruitment business when multinationals were starting operations in eastern Europe and Russia in the wake of the collapse of communism. Launched in 1993 in Budapest, today Antal is a £10m-turnover business with more than 100 offices in 30-plus countries, with plans for Vietnam, Mongolia and others. Tony: “with little idea how I was going to achieve my goals, I had the guts to start my own business and make it work. Despite the unknown territory and language barriers, I've developed a flourishing business on a global scale. I am not particularly talented, but I am relentless!”

Philip Burgan has run the Maria Mallaband Care Group (named after his grandmother) since 1996, building it into one of the UK's largest independent providers of care for the elderly and mentally ill. Recently, the fast-growing group took over 35 homes from Southern Cross, after it went into a high-profile administration. The acquisition secured 2,250 jobs. Maria Mallaband employs 4,000 people, with a £90m turnover. Previously, Philip built up and sold the Medimart chain of pharmacies. Now 60, Philip recently completed the Three Peaks challenge for the second time. “I can't imagine anything worse than retiring,” he says.

Alastair Lukies is CEO and co-founder of Monitise, which he set up in 2002 after an early career as a rugby player/ Alastair's vision was for Monitise to be “the world leader in mobile banking, payments and commerce, providing services to hundreds of millions of consumers.” With revenues doubling to £14m and on track to double again, 2011 has been a breakthrough year. Monitise has also formed a JV in Indonesia, renegotiated its global agreement with Visa, and launched the Mobile Money Network, in partnership with Carphone Warehouse founder Charles Dunstone. “I am extremely proud to be CEO of a British-based technology company exporting skills and expertise,” says Alastair.

Gareth Williams is CEO and co-founder of Skyscanner, the travel search site that provides online price comparisons on millions of flights, car hire and hotels. The business was born out of personal frustration at the difficulties of finding flights: Gareth started a spreadsheet to compare prices, and Skyscanner was born. Today, Skyscanner receives more than 15 million hits per month, with 94 per cent year-on-year growth; more than 130 people work at its Edinburgh office, with a new outpost recently set up in Singapore. This year alone, Skyscanner has launched an iPhone app (two million downloads in six months) and the world's first free-text flight search tool on Twitter, allowing users to “tweet a flight”.

Helen Dhaliwal runs the UK's fastest-growing restaurant chain, Red Hot World Buffet (RHWB). She operates the most popular restaurant in five out of six of the cities she operates in, and will own 25 restaurants by 2014. She's overseen profits growth of 9,000 per cent in seven years, and aims to continue that growth by ensuring that every single RHWB outlet generates the highest turnover in its respective city. Before RHWB, the “all you can eat buffet” conjured images of tatty restaurants displaying luke-warm food; Helen has turned that image on its head by bringing in world-class artisan-chefs from around the world. Helen's apprenticeship programme will recruit 200 young people this year, and she aims to become the UK's largest apprenticeship provider. 

Starting her business in 2007, at the age of 33, Sam Smith became the youngest and only female CEO in the City's investment banking community. In just four years, finnCap has grown to a 50-strong team and is the number two-ranked broker by number of clients trading on London's AIM. Despite the rough economic conditions, finnCap has grown profitability by 130 per cent, across all areas of the business, driven by a series of successful fund-raisings, totalling £140m. Described as “a hard taskmaster and driven to succeed”, Sam is also a keen contributor to society and, in particular, the development of young female talent in the UK.

The winner of this category will receive a 1 night stay at the London Marriott Hotel, Grosvenor Square, an off-road voucher sponsored by Land Rover and a Regus Gold Card.