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 Energy Efficiency 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.
Nick Boyle
Founder and CEO of Lightsource Renewable Energy
In 2010, Nick founded Lightsource Renewable Energy, then just a six-person start-up, which quickly grew over 5 years to become Europe’s largest solar developer and operator and a recognised global leader. In his role as Group CEO, Nick’s dynamic leadership and vision has driven the company to tremendous success and in December 2017, Lightsource announced a strategic partnership with BP which has committed aggressively to accelerate the low carbon transition. The company has rebranded to Lightsource BP in affirmation of this powerhouse commitment which is set to shape the future of global energy delivery. Nick previously sat at Board and Senior Director level in a number of leading retail financial service companies. Throughout his career, Nick has always been recognised for his entrepreneurial skill and success in pairing retail financial products with low-risk, predictable investments.
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About Lightsource Renewable Energy: Lightsource is a provider of ground and rooftop solar installations in the UK.
Kilian Pender
Founder and CEO of hiber
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About hiber: Home energy product installation startup
Molawa Adesuyi
CoFounder & CTO of Recyclan
Tech entrepreneur passionate about building products and business that change lives
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About Recyclan: Tech Enabled Plastic Recycling Company
Patrick Sheehan
Founder and Managing Partner of ETF Partners
Patrick is a founder and Partner of the Environmental Technologies Fund. Patrick has worked in venture capital since 1985. He was instrumental in founding 3i’s venture capital practice, and later became the founding Managing Director of its Silicon Valley operation. Before this, he was a research engineer for GEC and Marconi Space Systems. He was a member of the Executive Committee and Board of EVCA from 2007 to 2010, during which time he also chaired the Venture Capital Committee. Patrick has a Ph.D. in Electronic Engineering from UCL, London.
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About ETF Partners: ETF Partners supports talented entrepreneurs and management teams with investment capital and experience.
Peter Horsburgh
Venture Partner and Founder of ETF Partners
Founder and Chairman at ETF Partners (Environmental Technologies Fund).
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About ETF Partners: ETF Partners supports talented entrepreneurs and management teams with investment capital and experience.
Ning Zhang
Co-Founder & Executive Director of Limejump
Ning Zhang is the Co-founder at Limejump.
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About Limejump: Limejump is a Technology-Driven Utility: harnessing the power of big data to positively disrupt and transform today’s energy market.
Adam Fudakowski
Founder and CEO of Switchee
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About Switchee: Data analytics and IoT business serving large social landlords
Peter Hopton
Founder & Various Roles of Iceotope
I’m an Entrepreneur, with skills in market strategy, ideas, innovation and technology. I’m an ideas persons and I’m one for spotting inefficiencies within systems, which has led me into the realms of “GreenIT” I invented Iceotope, a server cooling technology that has had millions of pounds of investment and I believe will change the data center and server industry forever. I’m now the CEO of this promising technology company that encapsulated electronics inside of liquid filled blades. I’m the founder and now a non-exec at Very Innovative Group, a group of multi-award winning companies: VeryPC – manufacturing energy efficient desktops for education BothRealities – providing all-inclusive IT services Serverous.net – providing bespoke server and storage products to cloud and hosting I regularly speak about sustainability and technology at regional, national and international conferences. (Global Forum, UKCEED, BETT, NAACE, Digital 2020 Yorkshire, etc.) I was also part of the foreign office Green IT mission to Tokyo. I’m on the Green IT and Data Centre Strategy committees at the BCS (British Computer Society – the Chartered Institute for IT) and reasonably regularly speak about Green IT on behalf of the society. For my work I’ve been made a Freeman of the Company of Cutlers in Hallamshire and received several awards for the companies that I’ve started. Specialties: Computer system design, energy consumption reduction, Green IT, Network design, negotiation, ideas and innovation, problem solving, crisis management, leadership, Green Computing, energy efficiency
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About Iceotope, VeryPC: Engineered to cool the whole IT stack, in every use case, from Hyperscale to the Extreme Edge
Ian Scott
Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of Moltex Energy
Ian went to Cambridge University to study nuclear physics, but was seduced during his first year by the excitement of the biological sciences and made his career in that field. He became Chief Scientist for Unilever plc before leaving to start an entrepreneurial drug discovery company. In 2012 he became bemused by how nuclear energy had gone from being “too cheap to meter” to too expensive to afford and determined to try to remedy that flaw. The result was his invention of the Stable Salt Reactor and the creation of Moltex Energy.
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About Moltex Energy: Moltex Energy is developing a next generation nuclear reactor that can produce clean electricity
John Durham
Co-Founder and Chairman of Moltex Energy
An active philanthropic environmentalist, John has been focused on innovative ways of influencing UK policy to tackle climate change since his retirement from the software industry in 2005. He co-founded the Weinberg Foundation with Bryony Worthington and through the Foundation met Ian Scott. He saw the enormous potential of the Stable Salt Reactor and formed a partnership with Ian, Moltex Energy LLP, to help bring this potentially world saving technology off paper and into reality.
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About Moltex Energy: Moltex Energy is developing a next generation nuclear reactor that can produce clean electricity
Shravane Balabasqer
Founder | CEO of Carbon Analytics
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About Carbon Analytics: A granular asset focused carbon intelligence & offsetting platform for active industrial decarbonisation across the value chain.
Yohei Kiguchi
Co-Founder & CEO of Enechange
Graduated from the University of Tokyo and Oxford graduate school. Joined Milog in 2009. He participated as a co-founder. Joined Cambridge Energy Data Lab in 2013. Jointly joined as a co-founder and data scientist. Joined ENECHANGE in 2015. He participated as a co-founder. Joined SMAP Energy in 2016. He participated as a co-founder. Was elected in 2017 Forbes Europe as 30 entrepreneurs under the age of 30 (“FORBES 30 UNDER 30 EUROPE”).
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About Cambridge Energy Data Lab, Enechange, SMAP Energy: ENECHANGE is the technology-focused multi-national energy ventures.
Gregor Hoefter
Founder of GridDuck
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About GridDuck: GridDuck is a cloud-based hardware, dashboard & API enabling control of your clients’ energy
Simon Phelan
Co-Founder and CEO of Hometree
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About Hometree: Hometree exists to make home ownership simple & sustainable
Daniel White
CEO and Founder of Signol
Dan is a behavioral and environmental expert with extensive experience of devising and delivering successful innovations. Over the last 10 years, Dan has been at the forefront of applied behavioral science and has conducted several water and energy field experiments. Dan also lectures at University College London in applying field experiments to change energy consumption behavior.
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About Signol: Signol develops software which focuses on fuel efficiency by analysing operational data.
Robert Hahn
Chief Strategy Officer and Co-Founder of Signol
Bob is a visiting Professor and former Director of Economics at the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the University of Oxford. He also has senior affiliations with Georgetown University and the Brookings Institution. Bob’s experimental research focuses on regulatory and economic issues in energy and transport. Previously, Bob worked for the US Council of Economic Advisers where he helped design an innovative market-based approach for reducing acid rain. Bob has served on the faculties of Harvard University and Carnegie Mellon University and recently served as a member of the U.S. Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking.
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About Signol: Signol develops software which focuses on fuel efficiency by analysing operational data.
Damon Hart-Davis
CTO & Co-Founder of Vestemi
Damon has a Masters in Computer Science with a focus on AI and 20 years of experience designing and optimising systems in the City. Previous start-ups included one of the UK’s first ISPs and a virtual credit company. He has also worked with DECC advising on energy efficiency from 2009.
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About Vestemi: Vestemi is a new technology product company with a social purpose.
Mark Hill
CIO and Co-Founder of Vestemi
Mark has a computer systems engineering background with 15 years of experience managing complex IT systems in the City and 7 years working in start-ups in a variety of leadership roles.
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About Vestemi: Vestemi is a new technology product company with a social purpose.
Dan Simmons
Founder and Director of Quensus
Dr Dan Simmons has a Masters + PhD in Electrical Engineering, and is an expert in water sustainability, software development and wireless technologies. Based on this skill set, he founded Quensus in 2015, which shaped a step-change in the water-saving industry.
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About Quensus: Water management system to monitor and control water infrastructure
Neil Wilson
Founder and CEO of Camfridge
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About Camfridge: Camfridge is creating a new generation of low carbon cooling products.
Peter Bruce
Founder and Chief Scientist of Faraday Institution
Peter Bruce is the founder and chief scientist of the Faraday Institution.
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About Faraday Institution: Faraday Institution is an independent institute for electrochemical energy storage research and skills development.
Allan ‘Noel-edge’ Okello
CEO & Founder / Director of Plexus Wifi
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About Plexus Wifi: City wide Solar powered payg wifi for African cities
James Pulver
Founder of Housahedron
Founder at Housahedron
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About Housahedron, Spacesweets: Housahedron creates live visualizations of indoor climates and energy performances of buildings.
John Donovan
Founder of Housahedron
Founder at Housahedron
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About Housahedron: Housahedron creates live visualizations of indoor climates and energy performances of buildings.
Dan Mauger
CIO & Co-Founder of Demand Logic
Dan is an experienced developer of enterprise information and ecommerce systems and has an MSc in Information Systems from City University for which he won a departmental award. Dan leads on the development of Demand Logic’s core software, from the underlying data management engines to the front-end web application.
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About Demand Logic: Demand Logic is an online energy efficiency system that analyzes data from building management systems.
Joe Short
Chief Scientist & Co-Founder of Demand Logic
Joe is a clean-tech innovator and advocate who has worked for over 25 years in the sustainability sector, both in campaign organisations and start-ups. He has a degree in physics/philosophy from York University, trained in journalism at Reuters, has an MSc in renewable energy technology and a masters in sustainable development. Before co-founding Demand Logic, he successfully promoted demand response in policy and Parliament. At Demand Logic he leads on innovation, science and machine learning, as well as working on design, communications and development.
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About Demand Logic: Demand Logic is an online energy efficiency system that analyzes data from building management systems.
Gilbert Lennox-King
CEO & Co-Founder of Demand Logic
Mike is a leading expert in building services engineering, and has worked in the field for over 20 years. He has designed and delivered controls systems for multi-million pound installations, including for major banks, covering business-critical systems. Mike leads all our engineering and energy efficiency work and provides consultancy support for clients.
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About Demand Logic: Demand Logic is an online energy efficiency system that analyzes data from building management systems.
Henrik Thorsen
Co-Founder & CEO of Energy Cool
Henrik Thorsen is Co-Founder & CEO at Energy Cool
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About Energy Cool: The Company with the Green Vision.
Lars Frank
Co-Founder of Energy Cool
Lars Frank is Co-Founder & Directors at Energy Cool.
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About Energy Cool: The Company with the Green Vision.
