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 Founder operating in the Crowdfunding 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.
Max Keiser
Founder of StartCOIN Holdings
Max Keiser is an American broadcaster and film-maker. He hosts Keiser Report, a financial program broadcast on RT, an English-language news channel which brings the Russian view on global news; presents a weekly show about finance and markets on London’s Resonance FM; and writes for [The Huffington Post](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/huffingtonpost). Keiser is the CEO and co-founder of [StartJOIN](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/startjoin-2). He is also a co-founder of HSX.com. Max Keiser invented “Virtual Specialist Technology,” a software system used by the Hollywood Stock Exchange.
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About Heisenberg Capital, StartCOIN Holdings: Provides you with the world’s first rewards-based crowdfunding for startups.
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Michael Raven
Founder of Blazon Agency
Michael Raven is Founder & Managing Director of Blazon Agency. Michael has had Two Startup exits, and has ran 70 Agency Campaigns across Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and direct launches, actively participating in the raising of over $115M+ for his extensive list of clients.
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About Blazon Agency: The Brand Launch Agency
Ashley Turing
CEO & Founder of LiveTree
Ashley Turing, LiveTree CEO, is an entrepreneur and investor with a diverse background and over twenty years’ experience in technology innovation. Ashley is a specialist on blockchain intellectual property rights management and featured speaker at various conferences around the globe.
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About LiveTree: LiveTree is a social UK crowdfunding platform based in Hackney, London.
Jamie A Ward
Co-Founder & Technology Officer of LiveTree
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About Goldsmiths, University of London, Goldsmiths, University of London, LiveTree, UCL: LiveTree is a social UK crowdfunding platform based in Hackney, London.
Jeff Lynn
Co-Founder & Executive Chairman of Seedrs
Jeff Lynn is Executive Chairman and co-founder of Seedrs, the leading pan-European equity crowdfunding platform. Seedrs lets investors invest as much or as little as they like in startups they choose, and it lets startups raise capital from friends, family, angels, institutions and the crowds, all through a simple, online process. In addition to running Seedrs, Jeff serves as founding Chairman of The Coalition for a Digital Economy (Coadec), a non-profit advocacy group for digital startups and SMEs.
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About Seedrs: Seedrs is a UK-based investment and crowdfunding platform.
Anj Latif
Co-Founder and CTO of British Pearl
Anj Latif is one of the founders of British Pearl and is the Chief Technical Officer. He is responsible for the design, implementation and administration of the entire IT infrastructure, including information security. Anj is a highly motivated and ambitious professional with extensive experience in IT management and networking and two decades’ experience in the SME sector. He has worked with companies in retail, legal, manufacturing, finance and health using technologies from Cisco, WatchGuard, Citrix, VMware and Microsoft. He has a BSc (Hons) in Software Engineering from Oxford Brookes University.
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About British Pearl: British Pearl is an online property investment platform facilitating share and loan-based investment in UK property.
Ali Celiker
Founder and CEO of British Pearl
Ali Celiker is the founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of British Pearl. He is an experienced financial professional and entrepreneur and has spent the last 19 years in financial services. He thrives on building innovative businesses with inspirational people and is principally interested in the alternative finance market , with a focus on equity and debt based collective investment platforms. Prior to establishing British Pearl Ali worked within the global capital markets as a trader and sales person. This included Vice President, Head European Financing Trader at Paloma Securities London Limited and Associate Director, Interest rates sales trader at Mitsubishi UFJ Securities International plc. He has also worked for BNP Paribas, J.P.Morgan and Martins Brokers (UK) PLC. He holds a BA (Hons) in Economics and Econometrics from Kent University and other banking related professional qualifications.
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About British Pearl: British Pearl is an online property investment platform facilitating share and loan-based investment in UK property.
Duncan Grierson
CEO and Founder of Clim8 Invest
Duncan Grierson is a Entrepreneur with VC experience in Paris, London, Silicon Valley & Chicago. He is a Founder CEO of 2 ventures backed by over £50m from likes of Goldman Sachs, Fidelity et al.
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About Clim8: Clim8 is a pioneering green Fintech company.
Simone Mazzuca
CEO and Founder of Wallex Bank & Statutory Trust
Simone Mazzuca is the CEO and Founder of Wallex Bank.
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About Wallex Bank & Statutory Trust: Assets and Digital Assets financial service provider.
Ricardo Brizido
Co-Founder & Chief Technology Officer of Stake
Ricardo Brizido is the Co-Founder and CTO at Stake.
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About Stake: Stake Properties is a digital real estate investment platform.
Fausto Zanetton
Co-Founder & CEO of Tifosy
Fausto Zanetton is an Italian raised in Belgium, has spent his career in the finance Industry, where he worked with many media, sports & internet companies globally, most recently at Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs. Seeing sports clubs struggle to get traditional funding, and the growing tech, social and crowdfunding revolution, sparked the idea of Tifosy in his mind. Fausto has an MBA from London Business School and is a qualified accountant (CPA). He is fluent in several European languages and is a huge fan of Inter Milan.
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About Tifosy: Tifosy helps sports clubs raise funds online by connecting them with a global fan and investor base
James Pollock
Co-Founder, CMO & Head of UK of Tifosy
A veteran of major blue-chip marketing companies, having begun his career at Procter & Gamble in London, then heading up European businesses in Geneva, before returning home to bring his strategic expertise to other FMCG companies at Kantar Retail, a WPP company. Prior to joining Tifosy, James headed up strategy for one of the four business units at Unilever (Ice Cream and Tea). A fan of Arsenal FC since his early years, James also follows rugby and tennis.
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About Tifosy: Tifosy helps sports clubs raise funds online by connecting them with a global fan and investor base
Michael Bristow
CEO and Co-Founder of CrowdProperty
Mike Bristow, CEO and Co-Founder of CrowdProperty (www.crowdproperty.com), the leading specialist property peer-to-peer lender in the UK. Actual property development and investment experience lies at the heart of CrowdProperty meaning hands-on, expertise-led due diligence and loan monitoring. Lending is focused on the SME property developer market, a key segment for supplying much needed UK housing stock, which is poorly and inefficiently served by traditional funding sources. CrowdProperty’s unique combination of data, analytics, tech, expertise, rigour, relationships, security, extent of value chain disruption and vision means we stand out in sustainably delivering a better deal to lenders and borrowers alike through high-quality, institution-grade lending with huge potential ahead.
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About CrowdProperty, Growth Strategy: CrowdProperty is a property project program that develops a peer-to-peer lending platform to facilitate short-term loans.
Bill Morrow
Co-Founder & CEO of Angels Den
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About Angels Den, Morrow Moylan Capital: Angels Den is an angel-led crowdfunding platform.
Chris Wessels
Co-Founder & CTO of Paybase
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About Paybase: Paybase is a end-to-end solution for Payments, Compliance and Risk.
Béla Hanratty
Investment Director & Co-Founder of Align17
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About Align17: Align17 is a private marketplace connecting private wealth vetted institutional impact investment opportunities.
John Young
Founder of Funded City
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About Funded City: Invest in UK property for as little as £500 and earn 8-12% annually
Anthony Sinclair
Founder of Funded City
Founder at Funded City
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About Funded City: Invest in UK property for as little as £500 and earn 8-12% annually
Anthony Sinclair
Founder of Funded City
Founder at Funded City
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About Funded City: Invest in UK property for as little as £500 and earn 8-12% annually
John Young
Founder of Funded City
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About Funded City: Invest in UK property for as little as £500 and earn 8-12% annually
Siim Maivel
Founder & CEO of Investly
CEO, co-founder at Investly.CIO at €0.5M hedge fund investing into P2P loans, previously BA/Product Developer @ UBS WM Fixed Income
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About Investly: Investly is provide an invoice finance platform that lets you easily upload invoices.
Ruth Chamberlain
Co-Founder and Marketing Director of Investly
Co-founder and MD at Investly.Recent successful exit from OnTrees, previously business planning @ dmg media & Bauer Media Group
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About Investly: Investly is provide an invoice finance platform that lets you easily upload invoices.
Andrew Irvine
Chairman of the board and Founder of MatchPlace Limited
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About MatchPlace Limited: New generation Fintech platform. Integrating Financial Services solutions, bridging the gap between Financial Institutions and SMEs
Christophe Monget
CTO and Founder of MatchPlace Limited
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About MatchPlace Limited: New generation Fintech platform. Integrating Financial Services solutions, bridging the gap between Financial Institutions and SMEs
Benjamin Gedeon
CEO and Founder of MatchPlace Limited
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About MatchPlace Limited: New generation Fintech platform. Integrating Financial Services solutions, bridging the gap between Financial Institutions and SMEs
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.
Louise Wilson
Co-Founder & Joint Managing Director of Abundance Investment
Louise spent over 15 years at UBS Investment Bank and was responsible for structuring multi million pound flotations and share sales across several global regions. In the end she questioned why traditional markets don’t serve the ordinary investor and left to pursue a new degree and finding a way to build a fair society and while generating a decent return. Louise is on the Advisory Board for the Centre for Climate Finance & Investment at Imperial College Business School.
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About Abundance Investment: Abundance is an online debt crowdfunding platform allowing individuals to invest as little as £5 in to help accelerate net zero.
Karl Harder
Co-Founder & Joint Managing Director of Abundance Investment
Karl went from writing about renewable energy as a parliamentary researcher to running his first green business, which also pioneered the London Living Wage. After 5 years he recognised that finance was the key barrier to creating a more equal and environmentally sustainable world, so left to study for an MBA at Imperial College and to pursue the idea that became Abundance.
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About Abundance Investment: Abundance is an online debt crowdfunding platform allowing individuals to invest as little as £5 in to help accelerate net zero.
Rishi Sareen
Co-Founder & CEO of Startifi
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About Startifi: The social network for everything startup! A global platform for startups, entrepreneurs and investors!
Dillen Iyavoo
Co-Founder | CEO of Funding Tree
Founder at Funding Tree
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About Funding Tree: Funding Tree is the UK’s first fully regulated crowd-funding and peer-to-peer lending platform.
George Anastasi
Chief Business Development Officer & Co Founder of Funding Tree
Loves business & technology. Chief Business Development Officer and Co-founder of Funding Tree.
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About Funding Tree: Funding Tree is the UK’s first fully regulated crowd-funding and peer-to-peer lending platform.
Franck Zeitoun
Co-Founder & CEO of Lendery
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About Lendery: Lendery is offers a set of technology tools to institutional investors in alternative lending
Pierre-Jean Hanard
Co-Founder and CEO of SharePA
Pierre-Jean is the Co-Founder and CEO of Sharepa, an online platform providing actionable peer-based investment ideas for HNWIs by using social learning to support decision-making. He is also the co-founder of IDDEA, the first early-stage Swiss accelerator program focusing on sustainable investment. He advises several startups in FinTech, BioTech and Food Tech on business model, growth strategy, sales management and capital raising. With a keen interest in people development and entrepreneurship, he also enjoys coaching entrepreneurs on storytelling – personal narrative and startup story – using his experience as coach at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Harvard Business School (Advanced Leadership Initiative Program). He also sits on the Emerging Leader Board of the Boston Healthcare for the Homeless Program and regularly participates in FinTech conferences and competitions around the world as a mentor, an advisor and a jury. Prior to Sharepa, Pierre-Jean spent 10 years in banking in various management positions in London, Singapore and Geneva where he gained experience in strategy, sales, operations, cross-border and cross-functional business transformation. In his last role at HSBC Private Bank, he was both Head of the Private Wealth Client Segment and Chief of Staff to the COO. Working side-by-side with CEO, COO and Regional Business Heads, he turned around front office activities and front–to-back processes to deliver a unique and cost-effective experience to high-net-worth clients. Pierre-Jean earned an MBA as a Sloan Fellow from MIT (USA). He also holds a Bachelor degree in Management Science from the University of Liège (Belgium), a Master degree in Marketing Management from Vlerick Business School (Belgium) and a Master in International Economics and Management from SDA Bocconi (Italy). He is based in London, UK.
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About SharePA: SharePA aims to revolutionize investment advisory services for individual investors.
Frederick Bristol
Founder of Brickowner
Founder at Brickowner.
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About Brickowner, Bristolestates: UK property investment platform
Lars Kroijer
Founder & MD of AlliedCrowds
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About AlliedCrowds: AlliedCrowds combines technology, data, and finance to scale the sustainable development goals.
Mani Khiroya
Co-Founder & Investment Director of Propio
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About Propio: Propio is a crowdfunding platform that brings together investors property firms seeking funding for development.
Tom Buttress
Co-Founder & Managing Director of Propio
Tom is Propio’s day-to-day lead and is involved in all strategic and operational aspects of the business. An expert in building, improving and re-orientating regulated financial services firms, Tom previously worked as a management consultant advising household names such as Barclays, Bank of England, Aviva, FCA and T. Rowe Price. He holds a BA from Oxford University.
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About Propio: Propio is a crowdfunding platform that brings together investors property firms seeking funding for development.
Shahil Kotecha
Co-Founder & Investment Director of Propio
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About Propio: Propio is a crowdfunding platform that brings together investors property firms seeking funding for development.
Gary Corben
CEO and Co-Founder of Crowdahouse
Gary has been a residential property investor since 2006 acquiring and managing his own private portfolio. Gary has a background in entrepreneurial ventures in the music industry, in web-based businesses, and in property investment and trading, the common thread being taking innovative approaches to defunct and out-moded business models. In 1994 Gary joined UK startup Cerberus Sound & Vision, launching the world’s first digital music download service along with the world’s first functional online credit card payment system. In 2001, after two years at BSkyB heading online product development, Gary formed Whatmusic – an online record label specialising in restoring back catalogue for the music collectors market. In the first two years the company reissued over 80 titles and helped restore careers of dozens of ‘forgotten’ artists. In 2006, Gary decided to apply his online experience to the residential real estate market in the UK, including developing creative strategies to acquire properties without the need for bank finance and selling these properties to buyers at a premium. Since the credit crisis began, Gary has been at the forefront of non-bank funded property investment. In mid 2011, Gary joined forces with Peter Lane to form the Corlan Group to further explore the non-bank funded property market and to develop an asset backed crowdfunding solution, ultimately leading to the foundation of Crowdahouse.com.
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About Crowdahouse: Crowdahouse is a business to business peer to peer lending platform specialising in secured lending to property professionals.
Raphael Mazet
Co-Founder of Alice SI
Multilingual public relations and public affairs consultant specialised in running international corporate communication campaigns. Expertise includes media relations, government relations, M&A communications and digital communications. Currently based in Brazil, advising on corporate communications in Latin America. Specialties:Corporate communications, public relations, public affairs, financial communications, M&A, digital communications
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About Alice SI, CliqStart: Alice SI is using the approach to provide donors
Dom Wolf
Co-Founder & CMO of investUP
Co-founder at investUP.
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About investUP: investUP helps debt & equity crowdfunding investors see more, save time, and simplify.
Natalie Jonk
Founder of Crowd.Science
Founder at Crowd.Science
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About Crowd.Science: Crowd.Science is a crowdfunding platform that supports scientists build a community of funders for their research.
Robert Pasco
Co-Founder & CEO of Plend
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About Plend: Building a better way to borrow, where people are no longer held back by their credit history
James Pursaill
Co-Founder & CTO of Plend
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About Plend: Building a better way to borrow, where people are no longer held back by their credit history
Karteek Patel
Chief Executive Officer & Co-Founder of Crowdstacker
Founder at Nineyards Capital
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About Crowdstacker, Crowdstacker Holdings Ltd: Crowdstacker is a curated debt based investment platform.
Sagit Weiss
Founder and CEO of Crowdacure
Sagit Weiss is the founder and CEO of Crowdacure. She used to be a clinical fellow at National Hospital of Neurology and Neurosurgery. She earned her degree at Free University of Brussels.
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About Crowdacure: Crowdacure is a donation-based crowdfunding platform for life-saving.
Luke Barnes
Co-Founder & CEO of Fruitful Homes™
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About Fruitful Homes™: Fruitful combines real estate crowdfunding with modular home developments to make beautiful, affordable homes
Sheeza Shah
Founder, CEO, Podcast Host of UpEffect
Sheeza Shah is using technology to launch and fund companies improving the planet and human lives. As Founder and CEO of UpEffect, Sheeza combines her background in Computer Science with her passion for social entrepreneurship to work with revolutionary founders on UpEffect, a crowdfunding and support platform to launch products doing good in the world. So far she has helped companies impact 10,000 lives in 7 countries.
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About UpEffect: UpEffect is a crowdfunding platform for companies dedicated to improving lives and the planet.
Catherine White
Co-Founder & CEO of Fundzzle
Highly motivated entrepreneur with exceptional sales, marketing and business development skills. After 20+ years in Healthcare industry, now focused on doing good by leading a new innovative plaform that helps people gather more meaningfully through charitable giving and environmentally friendly group gifting.
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About Fundzzle: Fundzzle is an eco-friendly invitation, group gift and charity fundraising service all wrapped into one privately and securely.
Michael Brown
Co-Founder & CTO of Fundzzle
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About Fundzzle: Fundzzle is an eco-friendly invitation, group gift and charity fundraising service all wrapped into one privately and securely.
Ben Washington
Founder& COO of Homegrown
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About BWCUK, Homegrown: Homegrown is a property crowdfunding platform.
Mohammed Abdulmajeed
Founder of I Give Online
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About I Give Online: Crowd funding online. Made Easy.
Mohammed Abdulmajeed
Founder of I Give Online
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About I Give Online: Crowd funding online. Made Easy.
Luca Scali
Founder & CEO of FundingSMEs.com
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About FundingSMEs.com: Free database of startup funding. Provides informations on VC, PE and investors financing deals daily across the digital world.
