Best Startup
At Best Startup UK we track over 130,000 UK startups and over 500,000 people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top London based Director operating in the Consumer Electronics space. If you think a Director is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on editor@beststartup.co.uk.
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation โ Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth โ Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management โ Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact โ Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data โ We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Companies House UK, Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Sally Wright
Marketing Director of Samsung Electronics
Sally Wright is an experienced and commercially-driven marketing professional. As Marketing Director for Samsung Electronics UK and Ireland, she leads the enterprise marketing team and is responsible for setting and driving the brandโs marketing strategy for business. With a global track record of creating and implementing strategies that deliver P&L impact for Telco (fixed and mobile) and IT brands, Sally has delivered these quantifiable successes by consistently developing campaigns that speak to consumers while hitting and exceeding commercial goals. Prior to her role at Samsung, Sally held senior roles including Head of Enterprise Marketing for Vodafone and Managing Director and International Marketing Director for Pitney Bowes.
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About Samsung Electronics: Samsung Electronics is an electronics company engaged in consumer electronics, IT and mobile communications, and device solutions.
Renaud Di Francesco
Director โ Europe Technology Standards of Sony
Renaud Di Francesco joined Sony in 1998 to develop its external R&D cooperation, then leading its first Digital Cinema project. He is now in charge of the standardisation activity for Europe, with projects involving R&D and committee contributions. His current interests include energy efficiency, network architectures, M2M, multimedia from large venue cinema to personal wrist-watch formats, Mobility, M2M, industrial Internet and real time systems, user interface and accessibility, AAL. In previous assignments, he has worked for the European Commission, coordinating the preparation of Telecom Councils of Ministers, and earlier he managed the portfolio of network management, security and e-commerce in the Advanced Communications Technologies and Services programme. He started his career as a researcher in real time detection and speech coding (PhD, patent) at France Telecom, where he then became department head for new satellite services. His next move was to develop the multi-operator projects of France Telecom in core network (SDH, IP over ATM), service (ACE2000) and R&D (Eurescom).
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About CEN and CENELEC, Institution of Engineering and Technology, Sony: Sony develops and manufactures audio, video, communications, and information technology products for the consumer and professional markets.
Andreas Lane
Creative Director of Smarter
Andreas Lane is an award winning designer and has an extensive background in product design and manufacturing. Andreas has previously set up his own business in interior design and retail. As a founding partner at Smarter, Andreas works alongside the CEO, is responsible for the planning and management of product development and design. Andreas manages a team of manufacturers, engineers and developers in the UK and manufacturers in Asia. He oversees the entire product development cycle from concept, feature creation to design and mass production. Andreas is responsible for the development of Smarterโs brand and design. He has created the Smarter product range from physical products, packaging and print to the software and its apps.
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About Smarter: Smarter develops connected kitchen products that bridge the gap between the traditional and smart kitchen.
Isabella Lane
Managing Director of Smarter
Isabella is responsible for ensuring that the visions and strategic plans of the Board and CEO are realised and translated into the day-to-day running of the business. Isabella has oversight of each department from finance to customer services keeping the various teams motivated and driven to reach Smarterโs goals and targets. As a founding partner at Smarter, Isabella has extensive experience in all aspects of the business. Being instrumental alongside the CMO for strategic partnerships, Isabella has worked with some of the largest names in the industry e.g. Bosch, Unilever, Amazon, John Lewis.
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About Smarter: Smarter develops connected kitchen products that bridge the gap between the traditional and smart kitchen.
Darren Barson
Finance Director of Smarter
As Finance Director at Smarter, and in addition to overall ownership of the core Finance function, Darren is part of the management team and provides commercial insight and support across a variety of key business decisions. Darren joins Smarter having spent the past 7 years working in Asia across various commercial finance roles, most recently as Head of Financial Operations for St Jamesโs Place Wealth Management (FTSE). โJoining the Smarter team was one of the easiest decisions Iโve ever had to make. The industry leading products, global opportunity and the team translates into a journey I had to be part of.โ
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About Smarter: Smarter develops connected kitchen products that bridge the gap between the traditional and smart kitchen.
Ran Janda
Executive Director of Smarter
Ran heads Internal Operations and is the Executive Director at Smarter, London. Ran has visibility of all the departments in the business. She has over five yearsโ experience in technology startups. Ran is responsible for ensuring that the business has the best working environment and processes in place. To this end, she has grown the business from four to 30 employees, overseen a major office move from Croydon to London. Ran is also responsible for HR, day-to-day internal management and also manages logistics for major exhibitions and conferences the Smarter attends. Before joining Smarter, Ran worked for Xively Ltd, an IoT connected product management platform. She had overall responsibility for the day-to-day financial management as well as supporting the growth of the company in recruitment and HR. Over the course of two years, the company experienced rapid growth and was acquired by Boston-based remote access firm LogMeIn in 2011 for $15M.
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About Smarter: Smarter develops connected kitchen products that bridge the gap between the traditional and smart kitchen.
Martin Arumemi
Co-Founder & Managing Director of EE
Arumemi-Ikhide is the MD and Founder of EE. He also serves as the MD of Hansworth Ltd and General Manager of Engineering for Rockson Engineering. In both Hansworth and Rockson Engineering he is responsible for the leadership, execution and construction of the 4 NIPP power plants in FGN. He has lead the firm to the successful commissioning of the first phase of the 1074MW Alaoji CCGT plant. He is also progressing the completion of the 225MW Omoku, 225MW Gbarain and 338MW Egbema OCGT also based in FGN. Prior to joining Hansworth, Dr Arumemi-Ikhide worked for GE Power and Water for more than seven years as a Senior Project Manager, overseeing the execution of several landmark projects. At GE he was the Project Manager for two combined cycle plants that were using GE 9FB based in Spain and Turkey notably. Whilst at GE, he was on the fast track of the firmโs world renowned leadership programme. Dr Arumemi-Ikhide holds a Doctorate of Philosophy in Electrical Engineering from Warwick University. He also holds a Bachelor of Engineering in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from University of Birmingham. He possesses and is attending a number of business management executive courses including leadership programme from Boston University and is currently completing a leadership programme at Oxford University Business School.
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About EE, Rockson Engineering: EE is a telecommunications company that provides 4G mobile and fixed fiber broadband services to personal and business customers.
Neil Sawyer
Commercial Channel & Edu/SMB Director of HP
Neil Sawyer is Director of Education for HP in the UK&I. Over the last 15 years Neil has developed a broad knowledge of the key solutions, partnerships and insights that have helped a number of schools, colleges and Universities in their decision making and investment in educational technology.
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About HP: HP is a manufacturer and seller of personal computers, printers, computer hardwares, and business solutions.
Alberto Spinelli
Director โ Digital Services Business, Europe of Canon
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About Canon, Fing: Canon is a manufacturer of business and consumer imaging products.
Colin Roughan
Managing Director, Asia Pacific of SquareTrade
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About SquareTrade, The Natural Edition: SquareTrade is an independent warranty provider for consumer electronics and appliances.
Cristina Data
Director of Insight and Analysis of Ofcom
Cristina is the Director of Spectrum Information and Analysis at Ofcom, Cristina and her team are responsible for providing insight on market trends and their impact on spectrum demand across all sectors. Cristina is also overseeing Ofcom commitment to promote further spectrum sharing in the UK. Before joining Ofcom Cristina worked for Red Bee Media (now Ericsson) heading market intelligence and research within Strategy, and prior to that she held group strategy/performance management positions at both Orange UK (now EE) and Telefonica. Cristina started her career joining the graduate management programme of the FIAT Group (Fiat Grade) working in the UK and Belgium. Cristina holds a degree in Engineering from the Politecnico di Torino and a Post graduate in international relationships.
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About Ofcom: Ofcom is the UKโs communications regulator.
Ian Macrae
Director of Market Intelligence of Ofcom
Ian currently works as Ofcomโs director of market intelligence.
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About Ofcom: Ofcom is the UKโs communications regulator.
Ilya Feige
Director of Artificial Intelligence of Faculty Science
Ilya Feige is the head of data science and the head of research at Faculty. He ensures that cutting-edge machine learning is used across all Facultyโs commercial data science projects. Previously, Ilya worked at McKinsey & Company, helping to deploy artificial intelligence for some of the worldโs largest brands. Heโs also an honorary senior research fellow in artificial intelligence at UCL. Ilya was awarded the Goldhaber prize for the best PhD in theoretical physics from Harvard University, and the Governor Generalโs award for the single highest ranked undergraduate student at McGill University.
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About Faculty Science: Faculty provides data science and engineering training services.
Mike Warren
Operations Director of Nextbase
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About Nextbase: Nextbase design and manufacture dash cameras.
Eamonn OโHare
Independent Non-Executive Member of the Board of Directors of Dialog Semiconductor
Eamonn joined the Board in May 2014 as an independent non-executive Director. He was appointed as Chair of the Audit Committee in December 2014 and was replaced by Alan Campbell in July 2015. Eamonn has spent over two decades as CFO of some of the worldโs fastest-growing consumer and technology businesses. From 2009 to 2013, he was CFO and main board member of the UKโs leading entertainment and communications business, Virgin Media Inc. and led its successful sale to Liberty Global Inc. in 2013. From 2005 to 2009, he served as CFO of the UK operations of one of the worldโs largest retailers, Tesco plc. Before joining Tesco he was CFO and Board Director at Energis Communications and led the successful turnaround of this high profile UK telecoms company. Prior to this Eamonn spent ten years at PepsiCo Inc. in a series of senior executive roles in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. Eamonn spent the early part of his career in the aerospace industry with companies that included Rolls-Royce PLC and BAE Systems PLC.
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About : Dialog Semiconductor makes energy-efficient, highly-integrated, and mixed signal ICs for mobile, IoT, and solid state lighting applications.
Jimmy Kyriacou
Founder & Director of Unbox
Jimmy Kyriacou is the creator of #BehindTheFace and UNBOX, which is a collective of like minded entrepreneurs, creatives, scientists, artists and film makers with a shared vision of the future. UNBOX merges art, music & cutting edge technology with a specific focus on Augmented Reality. Enquiries & INFO : hello@unboxlondon.com
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About Unbox: Unbox is a blog site about electronics and the way they work and operate.
Christine Adshead
Non Executive Director of Ultimate Products
Christine Adshead is a Partner at PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers).
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About Ultimate Products: Ultimate Products is a brand and product development house in the UK that specializes in house-ware and electrical goods.
Chris Fuller
Director, Solutions Engineering โ Shape of F5
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About F5: F5 Networks provides application security and delivery tools.
Gary Newe
Technical Director of F5
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About F5: F5 Networks provides application security and delivery tools.
Chris Fuller
Director, Solutions Engineering โ Shape of F5
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About F5: F5 Networks provides application security and delivery tools.
Ollie Marshall
Managing Director of Maplin Electronics
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About Maplin Electronics: Maplin Electronics is an online retailer of consumer electronics.
Prem Rajalingham
Managing Director of Frontier Smart Technologies
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About Frontier Smart Technologies: Frontier Smart Technologies is a supplier of digital audio solutions.
Dmitro Khroma
Director Of Engineering of Swytch
Dmitro is an exceptional team member and essential Swytch component. He studied Engineering Design at the University of Bristol, specialising in Mechanical Engineering. Claiming to have been cycling before he was walking he loves being able to combine his advanced mechanical engineering practical experience with his passion for cycling and electric transport. Dmitro is a Royal Academy of Engineering Leaders Scholar and worked at Cambridge Consultants, a world leading engineering firm, where he developed ground-breaking electro-mechanical products with some challenging and exciting technical problems. None of which he will reveal to us, although there were rumours of a fruit-picking robot and a precision delivery drone so weโll have to take his word for that. It was good enough for us and we are exceptionally lucky he has been such a big part of the Swytch product development and will be with us in the future for our next adventures.
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About Swytch: Instantly convert any bike into an eBike (electric bike)
Hayley Bishop
Founder & Technical Director of Swytch
Hayley came onto this project right at the beginning โ practically for the first heartbeat of the product after joining the team during the Shanghai Bike Fair in 2016. With 12 yearsโ experience in Software Development and Design she is responsible for the management and delivery of all of our online content, branding, and marketing material. She has worked on a number of large high profile internal software development projects whilst running her own Design and Development company for the past 5 years which makes project managing such an exciting project, a necessary skill for us to take full advantage of. In almost exactly the same way as our customers, business aquaintences, friends and family members, Hayley reacted to electric bikes and in particular the Swytch bike; she wanted to be part of this movement and to get her hands on a Swytch bike as soon as possible. And what better way to do that then join the team!
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About Swytch: Instantly convert any bike into an eBike (electric bike)
Mili Tharakan
Director of Technology of Tilt Textiles
Mili John Tharakan loves all things textile and has been practicing in the field of e-textiles over the last decade. Her interest lies especially in the merging of electronics with textile materials and techniques, creating products that lie at the intersection of textiles and gadgets. A post graduate from Manchester Metropolitan University, Mili has held research positions with the Mixed Reality Lab at the National University of Singapore and the Smart Textiles Design Lab at the Swedish School of Textiles, researching on various smart and e-textile topics. In 2014, under the mother company Welspun, Mili set up TILT, a company developing Smart Home Textiles for the consumer market with a focus on developing e-textiles solutions for the home. Her current interest lies in understanding and resolving the challenges of scaling e-textiles for production, and designing great smart home textile experiences for the consumers. TILT launched its first products, SpinTales Enchanted Duvet and SpinTales Jungle Rug, during Holiday 2016 in the US.
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About Tilt Textiles: An innovative smart home company
Tim Hadley
Communications Director of ROXi
Tim Hadley is the Communications Director at ROXi.
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About Captini, ROXi: ROXi is a Music Entertainment System compay.
Adrian Drewett
Director of GridLocate Ltd
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About GridLocate Ltd: GridLocate โ Creating affordable end-to-end LoRaWAN IoT Solutions and GPS Tracking solutions for consumers and SMEโs.
Steve Miller
Managing Director of Insulin Angel
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About Insulin Angel: Insulin Angel is World smartest medication tracker.
