Your judges – The Startups Awards 2017

The judges for the 14th annual Startups Awards can now be revealed, and, once again, it’s a truly stellar line up of business leaders from the UK’s enterprise space.

With the shortlist now announced and the judging day fast approaching on October 11,  a host of familiar names have returned to the judging panel alongside a number of new faces.

These include high flying entrepreneurs, industry names and investors; bringing with them a wealth of business knowledge and expertise which makes them the perfect candidates to identify the next generation of top start-up talent.

This year’s judges include:

• Giles Brook, CEO of Vita Coco EMEA
• Paul Lindley, founder of Ella’s Kitchen and former Startups Awards winner
• Debbie Wosskow OBE, founder and CEO of Love Home Swap, co-founder of AllBright and chairman of Sharing Economy UK
• Dr Ben Medlock MBE, co-founder and CTO of SwiftKey
• Emma Sinclair MBE, founder of EnterpriseJungle
• Husayn Kassai, co-founder and CEO of Onfido
• Cassandra Stavrou, co-founder of PROPERCORN and former Startups Awards winner
• Sahar Hashemi, co-founder of Coffee Republic and founder of Skinny Candy
• Oli Barrett MBE, co-founder of StartUp Britain and Startups Awards host
• Jon Wright, co-founder of Innocent Drinks and JamJar Investments
• David English, chief marketing officer of The Start Up Loans Company
• Touker Suleyman, CEO and chairman of Hawes & Curtis and Dragons’ Den investor
• Liz Earle MBE, founder of Liz Earle Wellbeing
• Titus Sharpe, co-founder and president of MVF
• Natasha Frangos, partner and Head of Creative, Media and Technology at haysmacintyre
• Jamie Waller, founder of JBW Group, Hito and Firestarters
• Charles Tuke, director of Home House, CFO of Fairford Holdings

There are 14 awards categories for 2017, alongside the overall accolade of The Start Up Loans Start-Up of the Year and the People’s Champion Award; a title voted for by the public.

New for 2017 are two inaugural awards; The Start-Up Loans Inspiring Entrepreneur of the Year award and The Founders Pledge Social Impact Award, giving social enterprises and socially-focused companies, and Start Up Loan recipients, the chance to have their business celebrated and recognised on a national scale.

With StartUp Britain founder, and celebrated master of ceremonies, Oli Barrett MBE hosting the awards for a second year, 2017 winners will be revealed at an exclusive Startups Awards ceremony at Kensington’s prestigious Royal Garden Hotel on Thursday 30 November 2017.

View the Startups Awards 2017 finalists here and nominate your People’s Champion here.