37. Netduma

Founders: Iain Fraser and Luke Barlow
Launched: December 2014
Website: www.netduma.com

Iain Fraser and Luke Barlow started Netduma with a £6,500 loan. Within six weeks, they had made enough money to pay the loan back ten times over.

In today’s internet-reliant society it isn’t surprising that Netduma’s innovative router software – which eliminates congestion, lag, and other connection issues – is used by tens of thousands of customers across more than 95 countries, from the US to the remote Cayman Islands.

Bedfordshire-based Netduma was created out of a common problem. While studying at university, Fraser and Barlow found that they were being prevented from playing online games as their housemates had used all of their internet bandwidth to download HD films.

Keen to solve this problem – and get back to gaming! – engineer Fraser embarked on a PhD and eventually came up with anti-flood: one of Netduma’s pioneering features. From here, the unique software began to take shape.

When research and development was almost complete, Barlow quit his job to join the venture thus fulfilling a decade-old promise the friends had made to start a business together. In 2014, the Netduma R1 gaming router was launched.

In a testament to the power of influencer marketing, sales soared when popular YouTube vlogger Drift0r posted a beaming review of the router in June 2015. Since then, Fraser and Barlow say the business “hasn’t stopped growing” with awards and accolades pouring in. Netduma was named winner of Nectar Small Business Innovation in 2015 and was a two-time winner at the 2016 Startups Awards; clinching Lean Start-up of the Year and Export Business of the Year.

Netduma has become synonymous with seamless online gaming, disrupting the space with innovative router software where competitor companies concentrate only on hardware.

And with big plans ahead, we are confident that Netduma will retain its stronghold in the market.