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 United Kingdom based Founder operating in the Location Based Services space. If you think a Founder 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 – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – 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.
Michelle Kennedy
Co-Founder & CEO of Peanut
Michelle joined Badoo originally as lead counsel over 4 years ago. Prior to joining Badoo she was a successful corporate lawyer at leading international law firm, Mishcon de Reya, before being poached by the firm’s successful biotech client, Quotient Bioscience to head up their legal team. During her time at Badoo, she built the legal, compliance, HR and talent teams before moving into a more operationally focused role, including a position on the board. Today, Michelle is responsible for most key areas of the business, and works closely with founder and CEO Andrey Andreev, on the existing product, and exciting ‘special projects’ coming soon….
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About Peanut: Peanut is an online platform that provides a safe space for women to connect across fertility and motherhood.
Chris Sheldrick
Co-Founder & CEO of what3words
Chris worked in the music business for 10 years, booking bands and managing production for events around the globe. He was constantly frustrated with suppliers not finding site entrances, and bands not finding their way from the hotel to their gigs. Chris tried distributing addresses and GPS coordinates for years but both failed him on numerous occasions. He was certain there was a better way: what3words was born.
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About TED Conferences, The World Economic Forum, what3words: what3words is a mapping technology startup that creates a proprietary geocode system for logistics firms.
Jack Waley-Cohen
Co-Founder / COO of what3words
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About what3words: what3words is a mapping technology startup that creates a proprietary geocode system for logistics firms.
John O’Nolan
Founder & CEO of Ghost
Founder at @TryGhost. Tweets about open source, startup life, non-profits, and publishing platforms. Travels the world with a bag of kites.
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About Ghost: Professional, modern, open source publishing
Dimo Trifonov
Founder of Feeld
Dimo Trifonov is the Founder of Feeld
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About Feeld: Meet kinky, curious and openminded people.
Baran Korkmaz
Founder, CEO of ARWAY
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About ARWAY: ARWAY is a spatial mapping platform critical to building the Metaverse.
Akin Arslan
Founder, CEO of TIRPORT
Akin Arslan is the founder and CEO of TIRPORT.
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About AB PLUS INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIES, TIRPORT, TTT GLOBAL: End-To-To-End Logistics Operation Management, Digital PODs, Instant Vetted Truckers
Ant Ganjou
Founder & CEO of CÜR Media
Ant Ganjou a creative entrepreneur with a proven track record of building businesses and generating long term value for clients across a wide range of industry vertices. Currently in my role as CEO at CURB we have helped over 300 clients win hundreds of awards and generate hundreds of millions of pounds in exposure as well as direct business.
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About Airhead, Brand Advance, CÜR Media, DOOH, Gravity Industries, Handi, Hydra, Lifesaver, move.ai: CUR Media is a mobile application that enables its users to create online profiles to share music with their photos and videos.
Harry Howe
Co-Founder & CEO of Dronestream
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About Apian, Dronestream: Dronestream is a platform that allows drone pilots to collaborate with their organisation remotely, from anywhere in the world.
Phil Neale
Founder of Snoozle
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About Snoozle: Snoozle is a mobile app that seeks to change the way the world wakes up.
Yohann Merran
Founder, CEO, Lead Dev of Meet My Friends
Founder, CEO, Lead Dev at Meet My Friends
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About Meet My Friends: MMF is a hybrid app between a social network and a city guide, to spontaneously discover events you’ll love exploring with your friends.
Jonathan Wanono
Co-Founder of Meet My Friends
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About Meet My Friends: MMF is a hybrid app between a social network and a city guide, to spontaneously discover events you’ll love exploring with your friends.
Nicolas Slack
Co-Founder & CTO of Naurt
Nicolas Slack is a Co-Founder and CTO at Naurt.
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About Naurt: Naurt offers a plug-and-play toolkit for high-precision, beacon-free tracking that works anywhere in the world, both indoors and outdoors.
Ege Akpinar
Founder and CEO of Pointr
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About Pointr: Pointr is an indoor positioning and navigation company with analytics and messaging features.
Tughrul Arslan
Co-Founder and Chief Scientist of Sensewhere
Tughrul Arslan has held the Chair of Integrated electronic Systems at the University of Edinburgh. Arslan is an internationally recognized researcher in the design of low power systems and reconfigurable technology. He has been involved in two Proof of Concept projects concluded with a successful formation of 2 companies. He is co-inventor of a number of Sofant patents. Since 1989 he has carried out research into low power system architectures, ranging from circuits to sensors, and reconfigurable technology. He has authored more than 300 journal and conference articles.
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About Sensewhere, University of Edinburgh: Sensewhere provide hyper-local indoor positioning technology and applications for mobile devices.
Zankar Sevak
Co-Founder and Vice President of Sensewhere
Zankar Sevak serves as Vice President of Engineering at sensewhere Limited. Zankar Sevak is responsible for designing and developing the main GNSS application and support software for GNSS devices. He is the Principle Inventor of sensewhere proprietary Assisted GNSS technology and has worked at sensewhere for three years.
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About Sensewhere: Sensewhere provide hyper-local indoor positioning technology and applications for mobile devices.
James Cobb
Founder and CEO of Crowd Connected
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About Crowd Connected: Pioneering a new generation of big data location intelligence
Polly Barnfield OBE
Founder and CEO of Maybe*
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About Maybe*: Maybe*. The platform that connects the online, offline and social retail journey.
Paul Inman
Co-Founder and CTO of Maybe*
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About Maybe*: Maybe*. The platform that connects the online, offline and social retail journey.
Paul Inman
Co-Founder and CTO of Maybe*
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About Maybe*: Maybe*. The platform that connects the online, offline and social retail journey.
Mev-Rael
Founder & CEO and CTO of Bunny AI
Product Manager, Software Engineer, Designer, Leader, Martial Artist, Philanthropist, Buddhist, Teacher, Philosopher.
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About Bunny AI: Bunny AI is social search engine and marketplace for local on-demand services.
Akeem Ojuko
Co-Founder of Vima
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About Vima: The new home of premium video content. Powered by the blockchain.
Toby Hanington
Co-Founder of The Baobab Network
Toby Hanington joined The Baobab Network as Co Founder in 2016.
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About The Baobab Network: The Baobab Network is a tech accelerator that backs early stage ventures in Africa.
Tom Fairburn
Co-Founder of The Baobab Network
Tom Fairburn joined The Baobab Network as Co-Founder in 2016.
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About The Baobab Network: The Baobab Network is a tech accelerator that backs early stage ventures in Africa.
Christopher Kahler
Co-Founder and CEO of Qriously Technologies
Chris does CEO stuff. In line with Qriously’s roots, he is product-driven but interferes with everyone’s affairs whenever he can. He loves his job a little too much.
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About Qriously Technologies: Qriously Technologies is a service for measuring real-time, location-based public sentiment.
Abraham Mueller
CTO, Co-Founder of Qriously Technologies
Abraham is our super-smart, semi-cynical, quasi-sporty Server Mandarin as well as Qriously’s general technical architect. He also owns Android. We’re not convinced he isn’t one.
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About Qriously Technologies: Qriously Technologies is a service for measuring real-time, location-based public sentiment.
George Kazarian
Founder of Fabo.
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About Fabo.: Fabo is a media company focusing on mobile and social photo printing and digital in-store advertising.
Tom Richardson
Co-Founder and CPO of Lumio Technologies
Tom Richardson is the Co-Founder and CPO at Lumio Technologies.
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About Lumio Technologies: Lumio is you Intelligent wealth mentor. With the simple aim to maximize your money around your lifestyle
Adrian Shedden
Co-Founder and COO of Lumio Technologies
Adrian Shedden is the Co-founder and COO at Lumio Technologies.
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About Lumio Technologies: Lumio is you Intelligent wealth mentor. With the simple aim to maximize your money around your lifestyle
Charlie Richardson
Co-Founder and CEO of Lumio Technologies
Charlie Richardson is the Co-Founder and CEO at Lumio Technologies.
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About Lumio Technologies: Lumio is you Intelligent wealth mentor. With the simple aim to maximize your money around your lifestyle
Rossa Shanks
CEO & Co-Founder of GLP – Great Little Place
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About GLP – Great Little Place: GLP – Great Little Place is your little black book of great little places.
Rich Brown
Product & UX Lead & Co-Founder of GLP – Great Little Place
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About GLP – Great Little Place: GLP – Great Little Place is your little black book of great little places.
Deon Botha
Founder of Loci App
Founder at Loci App
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About Kite, Loci App: Social Discovery and Location Chat
Tarun Sainani
CEO & Founder of World Around Me
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About World Around Me, WT InfoTech: World Around Me is a local discovery app to help searching local places & services – on the phone camera with augmented reality – anywhere.
Simon Raper
Founder of Coppelia Machine Learning and Analytics
Simon is an RSS accredited statistician with over 15 years’ experience working in data mining and analytics and many more in coding and software development. His specialities include machine learning, time series forecasting, advanced statistical modelling, market simulation and data visualisation. In 2014 he founded Coppelia Machine Learning and Analytics whose clients include J S Sainsburys, Omnicom Media Group, FindMyPast and Blue 449 (formerly Walker Media), MSL Group, BARB and The Trussell Trust. He has worked with: Channel 4, ITV, Mindshare, McDonalds, Unilever, Jaguar, News UK, Credit Suisse, Betfair and AOL. His blog on statistics, cloud computing and data visualisation has attracted over 450K views and his posts have featured in the on-line editions of The New York Times and The New Yorker.
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About Coppelia Machine Learning and Analytics: Coppelia Machine Learning and Analytic combine an agile design methodology with the latest developments in machine learning & data science.
Cameron Wall
Co-Founder & Non-Exec. Director of RainCheck
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About Clash, Codesign Cooperative, RainCheck: RainCheck is a Contextual Commerce platform that allows brands to both track & influence online product discovery to in-store sales.
Nina Tumanishvili
Founder & CEO of HelloHub
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About HelloHub, Odin, TubeChat: Enhancing human connection through technology.
Koen van den Heuvel
Co-Founder and CEO of Fitu App
Koen van den Heuvel is the co-founder and CEO of Fitu App. Prior to this, Koen spent more than one year as a self-employed online retailer at Amazon.
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About Fitu App: Fitu App offer group fitness classes from freelance trainers for the price of a pint, at any desired time and location.
Eashan Maheshwari
Founder & CEO of Zappel
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About Anime Monk, Draper University, Zappel: Zappel is a mobile app that spontaneously connects the humans via hyperlocal informal events (known as Zappels).
Alexei Poliakov
Co-Founder & CEO of Locomizer
Co-Founder at Locomizer
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About Locomizer: Matching Audiences to Locations
Abhishek Mishra
Founder of Tring : Augmented Reality Messaging
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About Tring : Augmented Reality Messaging: Tring is a mobile app that allows users to send Augmented Reality messages to each other
Si Brown
Founder & CEO of skignz
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About skignz: skignz: A Precise Location AR platform providing an Enterprise API/SDK that is capable of placing digital content anywhere on the planet
Becca Hume
Founder & MD of TapSOS
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About TapSOS: TapSOS is an app for a non-verbal method of contacting the emergency services.
Aravind Sopinti
Founder of 9tree.co.uk
Founder at 9tree
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About 9tree.co.uk, 9tree.co.uk: 9tree provides IT consulting, digitalization, and managed services.
Borja Goyarrola
Founder of GoBe!
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About GoBe!: Knowledge Platform
Martins Zeps
Co-Founder & CEO of MAZE
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About ENME, MAZE: A platform that exploits an ecosystem of location-aware devices in the physical space and uses a proprietary algorithm to connect people.
Oojal Jhutti
Founder of iWazat
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About iWazat: iWazat is a smart platform that allows event organizers to quickly create web applications for their events.
Richard Humphry
Founder of Gelio
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About Gelio: Gelio is a geo-targeted mobile App that intelligently delivers real time promotions and live offers from local businesses.
Emile Bennett
Founder of Collections
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About Collections: Collections is a visual bookmarks app, designed to organize your ideas, inspirations, and adventures using your camera.
Francesco Mancusi
Founder of GoWar
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About FeedStock Ltd, GoWar: GoWar is a location-based social strategy game for iOS and Android operating systems.
Erica Melargo
Founder, CEO of Britalians TV
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About Britalians TV: Entertainment TV Channel and Production Company
Marco Biagioli
Founder and CEO of Britalians TV
Founder of Joboundu.
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About Britalians TV: Entertainment TV Channel and Production Company
Marco Biagioli
Founder and CEO of Britalians TV
Founder of Joboundu.
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About Britalians TV: Entertainment TV Channel and Production Company
Gary MacDonald
Founder of The Imp
Founder at The Imp
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About The Imp: Location, Context, Accurate, Battery Optimised
Paul P Roberts
Founder of The Imp
Founder at The Imp
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About The Imp: Location, Context, Accurate, Battery Optimised
Paul P Roberts
Founder of The Imp
Founder at The Imp
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About The Imp: Location, Context, Accurate, Battery Optimised
Seb Lyall
CEO / Founder of Locappy
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About Locappy: Locappy helps small local businesses reach out to their local community.
Alberto Comino
Co-Founder of DropBy
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About DropBy: DropBy any cities and places across the world – sharing and uncovering – every single day!
Alberto Comino
Co-Founder of DropBy
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About DropBy: DropBy any cities and places across the world – sharing and uncovering – every single day!
Chris Smith
Founder & CEO of 21:32 Ltd
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About 21:32 Ltd: Our technology helps brands connect with, learn from and engage customers, without ever knowing their name.
Chris Smith
Founder & CEO of 21:32 Ltd
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About 21:32 Ltd: Our technology helps brands connect with, learn from and engage customers, without ever knowing their name.
Dave Owens
Founder of TapWalk
Founder at TapWalk
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About TapWalk: TapWalk is a platform to create mobile apps for large events and venues.
