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 Managing Partner operating in the Internet space. If you think a Managing Partner 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.
Donatella Callegaris
Managing Partner of Flashpoint
Donatella joined Columbia Lake Partners in 2014. She is involved in the entire deal life cycle including assessing, evaluating and post investment monitoring. Donatella is focused particularly on CLP relationships with the equity sponsors ecosystem and on identifying high growth technology companies in need of growth financing that best suits CLP’s investment criteria. Prior to joining CLP, Donatella spent seven years working at Kreos Capital, managing several aspects of the investment process on a pre-term sheet and post-term sheet basis as well as managing the portfolio for technology and life science companies based in the UK, continental Europe and Israel. Donatella also managed various levels of the fund corporate governance for Kreos II, Kreos III and Kreos IV funds. Prior to this, Donatella worked in trust management. She holds a degree in Business Management from Birkbeck College, University of London and speaks both Italian and English.
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About Flashpoint: Flashpoint is an international asset management firm investing in tech businesses.
Ali Beklen
Founder and Managing Partner of HotelRunner
After working for several financial institutions and IBM, Ali Beklen co-founded HotelRunner with Arden Agopyan, with the ambition of converting the long-tail accommodation sales and distribution management from offline to online at global scale. For the last 10 years, he has been advising many organizations and initiatives focusing on digital transformation of the travel industry globally. He has publications in international refereed journals and conferences about service and cloud computing. He is Advisory Chair for Software Service Computation at the International Academy, Research and Industry Association. Beklen holds an M.Sc. in Computer Engineering and a B.A. in Economics. He is also a PhD candidate in computer engineering.
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About HotelRunner: SaaS enabled B2B network for accommodations and travel agencies to find, contract, connect, and transact with each other online.
Arden Agopyan
Founder and Managing Partner of HotelRunner
Arden Agopyan is an experienced entrepreneur and business development executive with a proven track record. Prior to founding HotelRunner, he led IBM’s Cloud Computing Software technical sales and market creation activities across Central and Eastern Europe, Russia, Middle East and Africa. His areas of expertise also include international team management, business execution, strategic marketing and financial management. As a talented hacker coming from software development background, along twenty years of business experience in technology, Arden is a Ph.D. candidate in Finance, holds a BSc in Computer Engineering degree and an MBA. Arden speaks five languages and is also Advisory Chair for Cloud Computing at International Academy, Research and Industry Association and co-author of a book, academic journals and articles.
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About HotelRunner: SaaS enabled B2B network for accommodations and travel agencies to find, contract, connect, and transact with each other online.
Ruth Mortimer
Managing Partner of Econsultancy
Ruth Mortimer is Managing Partner for Econsultancy, which provides digital transformation services through content, research, training, capability work and data. She was formerly the director of the award-winning Festival of Marketing and content director for Centaur Marketing, which comprises Marketing Week, Econsultancy, Festival of Marketing, Creative Review, Design Week, Celebrity Intelligence, Fashion/Beauty Monitor, Year Ahead and Foresight News. She is a PPA award-winning writer and author of five books on marketing. She is regularly asked to host events for brands such as Google and remains on the advisory board for the Festival of Marketing, which under her tenure, featured high profile figures such as Apple founder Steve Wozniak, 13 simultaneous stages, an awards scheme, a gig and a partner fringe programme.
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About Econsultancy: Econsultancy publishes research, analysis and advice on digital marketing, social media, e-commerce, SEO, mobile and tech for businesses.
Michael Edwards
Managing Partner & Co Founder of Inspire Group Investments
Michael Edwards is Managing Partner & Co Founder of Inspire Group Investments.
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About Inspire Group Investments: The Inspire Group is an integrated internet group of companies that prides itself in being there from the beginning.
Sam Crocker
Managing Partner of Bray Leino
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About Bray Leino: Back before anyone used the word ‘start-up’, Bray Leino did just that. Forty years ago we started up in North Devon
Josh Burley
Managing Partner of WebDesires
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About WebDesires: Web Development, Hosting, SEO, Semantic Search
