Britain’s tech billionaires and millionaires, including Sir Jonathan Ive, are defying the prevailing gloom in the economy.
BusinessCloud’s inaugural top 100 Tech Rich List has found the sector’s entrepreneurs and business owners are now worth £19.655billion.
Among them is Apple’s Chief Design Officer, who is responsible for world-changing gadgets the iPod, iPhone and iPad.
He comes in at number 29 on the UK Rich List, worth an impressive £152million. Scroll down to see who else has made it into the top 40.
The list is drawn from the ranks of those in mobile, telecoms, internet, software and computer hardware, whether selling, making or designing. Their wealth varies from £1.5bn to £40m.
It has been compiled by Philip Beresford, who also produces the annual Sunday Times Rich List.
The first part of the UK Tech Rich List covered numbers 81-100 and featured many stars of the software world.
The second part, counting from 61-80, boasted the founders of British unicorn Skyscanner and video game legends Rareware.
In part 3 – numbers 41-60 – there was Demis Hassabis, the prodigal genius behind Google’s DeepMind artificial intelligence operation, and Sam Houser, the man behind the phenomenally popular Grand Theft Auto series.
In this fourth instalment, we count down numbers 21-40, with the top 20 concluding the list on Friday.
21. Sebastian Knutsson – King Digital, £215m
DoB: 27/11/1968
Swedish entrepreneur Sebastian Knutsson co-founded King Digital, the London-based company best known for its Candy Crush Saga computer game. The sale of King to the US gaming giant Activision Blizzard valued Knutsson’s stake at £213m. Share sales at an earlier float in the US should take him to £215m after-tax.
22. Philip Hulme – Computacenter, £212m
DoB: 27/08/1948
Philip Hulme co-founded Computacenter, the Hatfield-based computer operation, with fellow Harvard Business School graduate Sir Peter Ogden (q.v.) in 1981. Hulme has a £92.5m stake and has sold around £30m worth of shares in recent years. Hulme also had a £100m stake in software company Dealogic recently taken over in a £438m deal.
23. Sir Peter Harrison & family – Ex-Chernikeeff, £205m
DoB: 29/04/1937
Sir Peter Harrison joined the Crest Nicholson Group in 1971. Eight years later he bought Chernikeeff, an ailing marine computer-network-integration company, for the princely sum of £133,000. Twenty years later, Harrison sold 49.9 per cent for around £100m, and the rest for £200m a year later. He is a generous supporter of charities through his Peter Harrison Foundation.
24. Daniel Borel – Logitech, £165m
DoB: 15/02/1950
Logitech, the world’s biggest computer mouse company, was co-founded by Swiss-born Daniel Borel in 1981. He retired in the summer of 2015, but will remain as chairman emeritus. Based in Berkshire and Switzerland, Borel has a £91.7m stake in Logitech, which is quoted on New York’s Nasdaq market
25. Ben & Jos White – Ex-Messagelabs, ex-RBR & ex-Star, £164m
DoB:15/03/1968 & 28/10/1969
The White brothers, Ben and Jos, are successful serial high-tech entrepreneurs based in Cheltenham and New York respectively. They sold three companies – RBR Networks, Messagelabs and Star – for nearly £500m. They now run Notion Capital, which has invested in Tradeshift, a highly-valued start-up, and Shutl, a same-day delivery platform recently sold to eBay. Another fund recently attracted £100m to invest in tech start-ups.
26=. Philip Doye & family – Kelway, £160m
DoB: 30/12/1967
Based in London’s Docklands, Kelway is a fast-growing IT services provider founded by Philip Doye. In 2014-15, profits doubled to almost £30m after Kelway secured big contracts including a £150m deal over five years with ATOS. American computer operation CDW took a 35 per cent stake in 2014 and bought the remaining 65 per cent in August 2015.
26=. Mark Shuttleworth – Ex-Thawte Consulting, £160m
DoB: 18/09/1973
Mark Shuttleworth, who has dual South African and British nationality, is largely based in the Isle of Man. He sold his Cape Town-based internet security company Thawte Consulting in 1999 for £400m. He has pledged half his fortune to charity and even after spending £13m on space flight, and prodigious charitable work including the free Ubuntu software operating system, Shuttleworth should still easily be worth £160m.
26= Graham Wylie – Technology Services Group and ex-Saga, £160m
DoB: 12/08/1959
A Scotsman, Graham Wylie co-founded the Sage software business. He left Newcastle-based operation in 2003, selling a large chunk of his stake for £116.5m. He poured £25m of this windfall into setting up Technology Services Group, a leading IT business. His remaining Sage shares should have netted Wylie around £80m. Other assets, including a golf club, a finance house and a string of top class race horses, put him at £160m.
29. Sir Jonathan Ive – Apple, £152m
DoB: 27/02/1967
Sir Jonathan Ive is the Chief Design Officer at Apple, responsible for best-sellers such as the iPod, iPhone and iPad. The ex-Newcastle Poly industrial design graduate was lured to California in 1992 and five years later was promoted to become the company’s design chief at 29. Salaries, stock options and property assets – including a £10m San Francisco home – should take Ive to £150m after-tax.
30=. Duncan Cameron, £150m
DoB: 26/08/1961
Tech savvy Duncan Cameron was hired in 1991 by Moneysupermarket co-founder Simon Nixon to turn a mortgage magazine into what became the hugely successful Moneysupermarket.com comparison website. Nixon gave Cameron nearly half the company and he retained his stake until 2007, when Nixon bought most of his shares for £162m in the run-up to the Moneysupermarket flotation. Today the low-key Cameron has a number of smaller ventures and plans to launch an online-only financial advice business called eVestor during 2016.
30= Noel Hayden & family – Gamesys, £150m
DoB: 28/12/1970
Gamesys runs Jackpotjoy.com, a website specialising in bingo, instant-win games and casino tables. Noel Hayden and two others founded the London-based operation in 2001. It was sold in March 2015 for a reported £426m. Hayden’s stake was worth £148.2m. After-tax and allowing for hefty dividends, he should be worth £150m.
30=. Chris & Gael Morling – Money.co.uk, £150m
DoB: 19/02/1970 & 23/08/1970
Cirencester-based comparison site money.co.uk was started by Chris Morling in 2008. The ex-IT worker had started building websites in 2001. It has been profitable from the start. Owned by Morling and his wife Gael, it should be worth £150m when conservatively valued against rivals.
33. Alan Jackson – Intercity Mobile, £143m
DoB: 11/04/1953
Alan Jackson set up Birmingham-based Intercity Mobile in 1986. Its parent was worth £82.3m in net assets in 2014. Jackson’s other companies take the total net assets attributable to the Jackson family and trusts to £133m. Other wealth adds £10m.
34. Darren Ridge – OneCom, £140m
DoB: 10/12/1962
Portsmouth-based Darren Ridge co-founded mobile phone retailer KJC in 1987. The business was sold in 2000 for £30m, netting Ridge £7.5m for his stake. He later took over as chief executive of the acquiring company, PNC. Today he runs fast-growing OneCom, a business communications provider that recently won a £500m order from Vodafone. In 2014 OneCom saw its profits soar to £17.7m on £59m turnover. Expanding fast and armed with the Vodafone contract, OneCom is easily worth £170m. Ridge owns an 80 per cent stake worth £136m. Previous sale proceeds take him to £140m.
35. Brian Conlon – First Derivatives, £127m
DoB: 07/01/1966
Brian Conlon learned his trade as an accountant with KPMG and went to work for Morgan Stanley in its risk management team. In his London years, he was famously treated for a knee injury by the same surgeon who looked after Gazza. Home beckoned and in 1996 he established First Derivatives in his Newry apartment as a consultancy and software business for the investment banking market with seed capital of £5,000. It floated on AIM in 2002 and Conlon has a £121m stake in the business.
36. Phil Cronin & family – Tombola.co.uk, £125m
DoB: 29/05/1964
In 2000, Phil Cronin set up Tombola.co.uk, which is dedicated to offering online games. The Sunderland-based Cronin family has been involved in bingo for 50 years and the new online operation made £12.2m profit on £44.2m sales in 2013-14. It is worth £110m. Other assets take the Cronin family to £125m.
37. Finlay Ross – Aquilaheywood, £124m
DoB: 04/09/1951
A qualified actuary, Finlay Ross chairs Redhill-based Aquilaheywood, a specialist software group in life and pensions administration. Ross led a management buyout in 1998.
38. Gordon Crawford – Ex-London Bridge Software, £122m
DoB: 04/03/1955
A former town planner, Gordon Crawford founded London Bridge Software in 1987. He made £76m from its 2004 sale and £33m in previous share sales.
39=. Gregory Darling & family – Gardline , £120m
DoB: 11/02/1953
Norfolk-based Gardline Group saw its 2013-14 profits fall slightly to £16.8m on £230.8m sales. Involved in satellite and GSM communications plus other marine services.
39=. Chris van der Kuyl – 4J Studios, £120m
DoB: 20/08/1969
Chris van der Kuyl, a top computer games entrepreneur, runs Dundee-based 4J Studios, best known for its Xbox 360 version of the hugely popular Minecraft game. That version sold one million copies within five days. The 6ft 6in tall Van der Kuyl rose to prominence in the late nineties and early noughties when he founded computer games company VIS Entertainment which was responsible for the State of Emergency game.