Ben Holmes of Index Ventures has moved up three places to the top of the tree in Business XL’s annual Power Top 50 list of influential entrepreneurs and investors.
The past year has seen Holmes and Index Ventures achieve an exit for portfolio company Betfair and close a £200 million sale of LOVEFiLM to Amazon. In topping the list Holmes has knocked industry stalwart Wol Kolade off top spot.
Holmes is firm in his commitment to technology investments and says, ‘I am very excited about investing in the mobile phone gaming market and think there will be a Zynga-sized company or bigger built off the back of mobile.’
Jon Moulton of Better Capital, and previously Alchemy Partners, is the highest profile mover: jumping 11 places to fourth place after making a success of his new turnaround investment vehicle and committing himself to 12 struggling companies since the funds launch in February 2010.
Also on the move is Vin Murria, CEO of Advanced Computer Software, who entered the top ten having climbed 15 places. A forward order book worth £85.2 million and profits of £10.4 million (up 14 per cent) has seen the AIM-listed business complete what Murria describes as a ‘truly remarkable year’.
The rest of the top five is populated by Robin Klein, founding partner of The Accelerator Group (2) and chief executive of small-cap broker finnCap Sam Smith (3).
Bob Holt is the biggest casualty, falling 12 places to 26 after housing maintenance luminary Mears was forced to issue its first profit warning on the back of the governments announcement that its was bringing forward its plan to half feed-in-tariff subsidies paid to businesses for producing renewable energy with solar panels.
Fresh faces in the list are led by Errol Damelin, CEO at short-term lender Wonga, a business which has raised £100 million in venture capital since the service launched in 2006. Damelin has entered at number eight, recognition for a year which saw Wonga top the Sunday Times Tech Track 100 list of fastest growing technology companies.
Other new entries have come in the form of fashion retailer ASOS’ CEO Nick Robertson, Dragons’ Den investor Theo Paphitis and British Growth Fund chief executive Stephen Welton.
