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 Cambridgeshire based Founder operating in the Software 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.
Alex Kendall
Co-Founder & CEO of Wayve
Alex Kendall is the co-founder & CEO at Wayve.
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About Wayve: Wayve uses end-to-end deep learning to develop artificial intelligence capable of complex driving.
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Simon Galbraith
Founder & CEO of Redgate Software
Simon is the joint founder and CEO of Redgate Software. Over the past 15 years, Simon has been part of Redgate’s growth from a 2 person firm operating out of a spare room to today’s 300 person outfit with hundreds of thousands of users. Although Simon’s responsibilities are primarily strategic, his background is technical with qualifications including a PhD in physics from Cambridge University and former employment with Shell and ThornEMI.
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About Redgate Software: Redgate is the leading provider of software for professionals working on the Microsoft data platform.
Lyric Jain
Founder & CEO of Logically
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About Logically: Logically develops the latest in AI technologies to combat information overload, misinformation, fake news & other types of harmful content.
Laurence Bargery
Co Founder & CTO of AccuRx
Laurence Bargery is a Co-founder & CTO at accuRx.
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About AccuRx: AccuRx is on a mission to bring patients and their healthcare teams together.
Ben Peters
Co-Founder and VP of Product of FiveAI
Ben Peters is a Co-Founder and VP of product at FiveAI.
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About FiveAI: FiveAI provides a software platform designed for providing a solution in urban mobility in public transport to complex urban environments.
Rohit Makol
Founder & COO of HeyHub
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About HeyHub: The community experience and tenant engagement platform driving operational efficiency across your spaces.
David Excell
Founder of Featurespace
Dave is Featurespace’s Founder and CTO,responsible for working directly with our clients. Dave is an experienced technology innovator with over 18 years dedicated to the study of engineering. He has received several accolades in his field, including the ITC Enterprise Award for Young Entrepreneur. Under his leadership, Featurespace has progressed from a concept to a commercial success. Dave currently resides in the U.S. and is managing the Featurespace global expansion from Atlanta, Georgia.
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About Featurespace: Featurespace provides an adaptive behavioral analytics technology and automated deep behavioral networks for risk management.
Mohamed Elmasry
CEO & Co-Founder of Tactful
Mohamed Elmasry is a person with “think, plan, act & accomplish” mentality who has a proven experience in motivating people to work towards challenging goals. I have been in the business world for several years running and growing businesses. I excelled in the fields of project management, business development, engineering management, and building strategic business relationships. My passion goes to distributive innovation, managing products development, defining processes and methodologies, also sustaining engineering and business activities.
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About Arm Holdings, Tactful: Unified Cognitive Customer Experience Platform
Abel Ureta-Vidal
Chief Product Officer & Founder of Eagle Genomics
With more than 12 years bioinformatics experience and a scientific background in molecular biology and immune-virology (PhD from the Pasteur Institute, France), Abel first mastered bioinformatics tools and code in the early 90s whilst working on viral phylogenetic studies. After his PhD, he joined the effort at Genoscope (Evry, France) in ramping up the human genome project, putting in place the automatic gene annotation system for human chromosome 14. In 2001, Abel moved to the European Bioinformatics Institute (Cambridge, UK) where he led the Ensembl comparative genomics team until 2007. He founded Eagle shortly before graduating from the Cambridge Judge Business School MBA program in 2008.
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About Eagle Genomics: Eagle Genomics is a enterprise software solutions company to enable the management, orchestration and exploitation of life sciences data.
Darran Milne
Co-Founder & CEO of VividQ
Dr Darran Milne – Chief Executive Officer, PhD (University of St Andrews & Max Plank Institute) Mathematician and Theoretical Physicist by training, with a PhD in quantum information theory from the University of St Andrews and the Max Plank Institute in Erlangen. Having started his career as a quantitative analyst at a large financial software house, he soon began to direct product development initiatives, and manage client implementation projects as a Scrum Master. As one of the co-founders of VividQ and its CTO, he directed the original research and development efforts of the team that evolved into the currently offered products. In his role as a CEO, he has been responsible for leading and execution of the company’s technology and commercial strategies.
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About VividQ: VividQ powers the revolution in digital display with Computer-Generated Holography.
Roman Pechhacker
Co-Founder and Head of Internal Development of VividQ
Roman Pechhacker is the Co-Founder and Head of Internal Development at VividQ.
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About VividQ: VividQ powers the revolution in digital display with Computer-Generated Holography.
Neil Davidson
Founder of Business of Software
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About Business of Software, Redgate Software: Business of Software provides single-track software conference services.
Chris Mitchell
CEO & Founder of Audio Analytic
Dr Chris Mitchell founded Audio Analytic following the completion of his self-funded PhD in sound information systems and signal processing. Chris received a prestigious Kauffman/NCGE Fellowship to investigate the commercial implications of his research, through which he received training at Harvard Business School and worked with Cisco Systems in San Jose, US. Subsequently, Chris attended the Ignite programme at the University of Cambridge’s Judge Business School, funded by the East of England Development Agency. He is an internationally published author, an associate lecturer at Anglia Ruskin University’s Design and Technology Department, and holder of multiple patents.
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About Audio Analytic: Audio Analytic creates exceptional human experiences through giving consumer technology a greater sense of hearing.
Sergey Usov
Director & Founder of Cambridge Nanotherm
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About Cambridge Nanotherm: Cambridge Nanotherm produces the industrys most efficient thermal management technology for LED applications and high powered electronics.
Tony Robinson
Founder of Speechmatics
Tony pioneered recurrent neural networks in speech recognition and has built and scaled multiple speech groups and companies. Tony’s passion is the development and application of machine learning to tasks that have traditionally been considered impossible for computers to solve.
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About Speechmatics: Global experts in deep learning and speech recognition
Ramsey Faragher
Founder & CEO of Focal Point Positioning
Ramsey Faragher is the CEO and CTO at Focal Point Positioning. He is a world-leading expert in GNSS-denied positioning and is pioneering the development of game-changing new technologies to set new standards in indoor positioning and autonomous positioning systems. He holds a first class degree in Physics and a PhD in opportunistic radio positioning, both from the University of Cambridge. Ramsey is also a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Navigation, and a Bye Fellow of Queens’ College, Cambridge. Previously he was a Senior Research Associate at the University of Cambridge, where he developed the first online SLAM-based indoor positioning system for smartphones. Prior to this he was a Principal Scientist at the BAE Systems Advanced Technology Centre where he developed the award-winning and patented NAVSOP opportunistic positioning suite and other GNSS-denied tracking technologies.
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About Focal Point Positioning: Focal Point has developed next generation navigation and positioning software for smartphones, wearables and autonomous vehicles.
Charles Lee
Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of Kontainers
Charles Lee is the co-founder and chief technology officer of Kontainers.
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About Kontainers: Kontainers is as Enterprise SAAS Provider providing e-commerce capabilities to Freight Forwarders and Shipping Lines
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.
Adam Durant
Founder & CEO of SATAVIA
Adam Durant is CEO and Founder of Satavia. Prior to founding SATAVIA, Dr. Durant worked as a professional scientist and held posts at the University of Cambridge and Norwegian Institute for Air Research. Dr. Durant has grown Satavia to achieve global recognition in the Tällt Ventures Disrupt 100 list in 2017 and was selected to participate in the 2017 SVC2UK CEO Summit held at Buckingham Palace. In addition, he has taken SATAVIA to the finals of Pitch@Palace 6.0; Mass Challenge 2016; and Copernicus Masters 2016. He has also won over £1.5m grant funding since 2015 from Innovate UK, Aerospace Technology Institute, and the European Space Agency for Satavia.
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About SATAVIA: SATAVIA simplifies decision-making for smarter, greener aviation
Tristram Norman
Co-Founder & CTO of Simprints
Tristram Norman, CTO and Co-Founder of Simprints. Tristram is a software engineer with an MSc with high honors from the University of London and professional certifications from MIT in Big Data. His software portfolio includes a complete systems portal with energy industry leader JDR Cables Inc. Tristram is a Forbes 30 under 30 Social Entrepreneur.
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About Simprints: Simprints is a nonprofit company building technology to increase effectiveness in how the world fights global poverty.
Toby Norman
Co-Founder & CEO of Simprints
Toby Norman, CEO and Co-Founder of Simprints. Gates Scholar and PhD in Management from the University of Cambridge, BA in Biology from Harvard. Toby has worked >10 years with frontline workers across Africa, Asia, and Central America on initiatives to improve global health and development through technology. Toby is a 2018 GLG Fellow, 2017 Schwab Social Entrepreneur of the Year, and 2016 Forbes 30 Under 30 Entrepreneur.
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About Simprints: Simprints is a nonprofit company building technology to increase effectiveness in how the world fights global poverty.
Nicolaas Matthijs
CEO, Founder of Fronteer LTD
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About Fronteer LTD: Creating awesome Educational Technology experiences
Nicolaas Matthijs
CEO, Founder of Fronteer LTD
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About Fronteer LTD: Creating awesome Educational Technology experiences
Kevin Marzec
Founder and CTO of FrontDesk Master
Founder and CTO at FrontDesk Master, CTO at ThisWay Global
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About FrontDesk Master: FrontDesk Master is a Game changer in property management systems
Dan Cvrcek
Founder of KeyChest
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About KeyChest, Smart Architects: KeyChest is a certificate management tool that helps small to medium sized businesses to website expiration due to unmanaged encryption.
Benjamin King
Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of Tumelo
Benjamin King is the Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer at Tumelo.
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About Tumelo: Tumelo is an impact-focused financial technology firm with the mission of giving every investor a voice.
Mohammad Al-Ubaydli
Founder & CEO of Patients Know Best
Mohammad is founder and CEO of Patients Know Best and has over 15 years of experience in medical software. He trained as a physician at the University of Cambridge; worked as a staff scientist at the National Institutes of Health; and was a management consultant to US hospitals at The Advisory Board Company. He is the author of seven books, including Personal health records: A guide for clinicians and Streamlining Hospital-Patient Communication: Developing High Impact Patient Portals. He is also an honourary senior research associate at UCL medical school for his research on patient-controlled medical records. In 2012 he was elected an Ashoka Fellow as a social entrepreneur for the contributions he has made to patient care.
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About Patients Know Best: Patients Know Best provide hospitals with personal health records software so that their patients can better manage their health.
Ken Banks
Founder of FrontlineSMS
Ken Banks is the founder of [Frontline SMS](http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/frontlinesms) and [Kiwanja.net](http://www.Kiwanja.net). He specializes in the application of mobile technology for positive social and environmental change in the developing world. He combines over 22 years in I.T. with over 15 years experience living and working throughout Africa in countries including Kenya, Nigeria (where he ran a primate sanctuary), South Africa, Mozambique, Cameroon, Zambia, Uganda and Zimbabwe. In 1999 he graduated from Sussex University with honours in Social Anthropology with Development Studies His vision is to empower others to create social change, and he does this by developing and providing tools to mostly grassroots organisations who seek to better use technology in their work. In 2007 he hit headline news on the BBC when his text messaging application – FrontlineSMS – was used to help monitor the Nigerian Presidential elections. Since launch the software has been successfully implemented in over forty countries including Afghanistan, Indonesia, Zimbabwe, the Philippines and Pakistan Ken has recently been interviewed by the BBC World Service, The Economist, BBC News Online, The New York Times, Nokia, Mongabay.com, The Africa Journal, White African and the Sussex University Alumni magazine, among many others, and he was recently invited to take part in an Aspen Institute round table discussion on the use of mobiles in activism and civic engagement. Ken has written about his work, and the wider role of mobile technology, for a number of publications including Pambazuka News, Didactics World and Vodafone Receiver magazine, and has a regular online column in PC World. He has also acted as an official judge for the Global Mobile Awards, the Mobile Messaging Awards and his own nGOmobile initiative, and is a regional judge for the 2008 Adjudication Panel for the African ICT Achievers Awards Programme He has spoken about the application of mobile technology at a number of conferences, workshops and organisations including Nokia, IDEO, Stanford University, the MacArthur Foundation, Amnesty International and the University of Arizona. He has also presented papers at the W3C Workshop on the Mobile Web in Developing Countries (Bangalore, 2006 and Sao Paulo, 2008) and the 16th International World Wide Web Conference (Canada, 2007), where he also sat on a specialist panel discussing web delivery models for emerging markets. Ken also spoke at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona (2008), and delivered a keynote address at Mobile Messaging 2008 in Cannes Ken was recently awarded grants from the MacArthur Foundation and the Open Society Institute (OSI), and has been short listed for two mobile industry awards for the development of FrontlineSMS. Between 2006 and 2007 he was based at Stanford University as a Visiting Fellow on the Reuters Digital Vision Program. He currently spends his time between Cambridge (UK) and Stanford University in California.
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About FrontlineSMS, Kiwanja.Net: FrontlineSMS is free, open source software.
Sithamparanathan Sabesan
Founder and CEO of PervasID
Sithamparanathan Sabesan read a BEng (Hons) Electronic Engineering at Sheffield University in 2004, where he scored the highest marks in his year, and was awarded the Sir William Siemens Medal for being among the UK’s top 18 science and technology students. Sabesan worked on RFID since beginning his PhD on the subject of ‘Passive RFID real time sensing system for intelligent infrastructure’ at Cambridge University in 2007 and was elected to a Research Fellowship at Girton College, Cambridge University in 2011. Prior to his PhD, he worked at ARM as an Electronic Engineer. Sabesan is a recipient of the 2011 Royal Academy of Engineering ERA Entrepreneurs Award and the 2011 UK ICT Pioneers of Connected World award. In 2014 he was awarded a Royal Academy of Engineering Enterprise Fellowship, and most recently he was awarded the Royal Academy of Engineering Engineers Trust Young Engineer of the Year award, as well as the Sir George Macfarlane Medal 2016 for excellence in the early stage of the career. He is a Fellow of the ERA Foundation.
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About PervasID: PervasID is developing a high reliability
Abhijit Naha
Founder of Zone V
Abhi has a long heritage with CW having previously founded the CW Handset Special Interest Group (SIG) in 2008, now called Future Devices. Prior to CW, Abhi studied Electronics and Electrical Engineering, has a MBA in International Marketing and interestingly, was approached by Cambridge University Press (alongside a colleague at the time) to write a book on Mobile Handset Design which was successfully launched in New Delhi. 20 years in the ICT industry, it’s fair to say Abhi has built up an enviable network of contacts, to the great fortune of CW! He joined the team in June 2015 as Head of Marketing before landing his current role as CCO. Abhi is responsible for commercial operations, engagement with the start-up community, and is a key driving force behind CW Unplugged; an initiative aimed at the younger generation. A strong advocate of digital inclusion and diversity within the technology industry, Abhi champions this across all areas within CW and actively mentors several young CEO Founders. Abhi, pronounced ‘Obi’ is a big Star Wars fan and occasionally uses his Jedi mind skills when negotiating sponsorship deals!
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About Zone V: Zone V develops solutions that make the best technology in the world work to suit your lifestyle.
John McInerney
Founder and CEO of Amperfii
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About Amperfii: Amperfii offers a data enablement platform that helps companies drive better business outcomes.
Ken Roberts
CEO & Founder of AudioTelligence
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About AudioTelligence: AudioTelligence delivers real-time audio processing technology for the enhancement of automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems.
Andy Ward FREng
CTO & Founder of Ubisense
Andy Ward FREng is the Chief Technology Officer and Founder at Ubisense.
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About Ubisense: Ubisense is a developer of real-time location systems that provide enterprise business automation services.
Pete Steggles
Founder & Chief Software Architect of Ubisense
Pete Steggles is the Founder and Chief Software Architect at Ubisense.
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About Ubisense: Ubisense is a developer of real-time location systems that provide enterprise business automation services.
Rupert Curwen
Founder and Applications Fellow of Ubisense
Rupert Curwen is the Founder and Software Director at Ubisense Limited.
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About Ubisense: Ubisense is a developer of real-time location systems that provide enterprise business automation services.
Paul Webster
Founder & Director of Hardware of Ubisense
Paul Webster is the Founder and Director of Hardware at Ubisense Limited.
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About Ubisense: Ubisense is a developer of real-time location systems that provide enterprise business automation services.
Josh Harris
Founder & CEO of Doc2
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About Doc2: Allowing SMEs to create, send and eSign their contracts in seconds.
Graham Campbell
Senior Software Architect/ Founder of Graham Campbell Technology
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About Graham Campbell Technology: Graham Campbell Technology offers software consulting and contracting services.
Sarra Achouri
Co-Founder | Chief Delivery Officer of OBRIZUM Group Ltd.
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About OBRIZUM Group Ltd.: Changing the future of eLearning with OBRIZUM, using Ai to create Automated, Adaptive, and Analytic eLearning.
Jerry Pett
Co-Founder & CEO of Thymometrics
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About Thymometrics: Always-On & Pulse Employee Engagement Surveys and Employee Feedback Solutions
Richard Hobson
CEO and Founder of Herdsy
Richard Hobson holds a B.A. in Finance & DBS(IT) from the Michael Smurfit School of Business. He has a diverse skillset as he is both a Software Developer and an Accountant who has worked in these roles for IBM and Aviva. Under Richard’s leadership, Herdsy has grown from a kitchen table business to one that has won international awards and was a finalist in 2018 for Cambridge Agtech Company of the year.
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About Herdsy: Herdsy automates and analyses farm animal data and converts it into valuable profit decisions for farmers.
Mark Stewart
Founder of sizzlepig
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About sizzlepig: Patented cloud process, templated based mass custom images.
