Founders: Mark Holland, Steve Webster, Karen Freeman, Kat Linger, Paul Cooke, Joe Inglis, Graham Bosher and James Davidson
Founded: November 2013 (launched July 2014)
Website: https://tails.com/

After becoming disillusioned with generic ‘one-size-fits-all’ dog food, the founders of tails.com sought about offering a “better, smarter and just plain simpler way” to feed man’s best friend. Tapping into the enormous pet food market, the business offers tailor-made dog food based on each dog’s individual nutritional needs. Delivered directly to your door every month, they also offer wet dog food and additional doggie treats.

Co-founded by eight entrepreneurs, the team have a diverse set of backgrounds in high-growth, consumer-facing and tech businesses. Current CEO James Davidson was previously head of operations at Innocent Drinks and, before that, operations manager at Unilever.

Backed by the founders of Innocent, LOVEFiLM and Graze (Graham Bosher is also a co-founder), tails.com received £5m seed funding in 2013 plus a follow-on Series A round in 2015. Developed with the help of vets and nutritionists, the team spent a year extensively researching, trialing and formulating their product before launch in July 2014.

Having grown to a team of 42 (from just 15 employees in January last year), tails.com is aiming to become a household name within the next 12 months, with an ambitious long-term goal to change “the pet food industry forever”.

Founder: Simon Brown
Founded: September 2013
Website: http://forrestbrown.co.uk/

ForrestBrown helps to reward UK businesses that invest in innovation. How? It provides specialist Research & Development (R&D) tax credit advice, working with a range of companies to help them achieve significant corporation tax savings – £35m in savings so far to be precise.

Launched in 2013 by chartered tax advisor Simon Brown, the Bristol-based consultancy has submitted 750 claims to HMRC on behalf of its clients to date and has had a phenomenal 100% success rate on all claims submitted.

With a 23-strong team of tax professionals and turnover of £3.2m for 2015 – a 166% revenue hike on 2014 – Brown believes it is the company’s “disruptive approach” which has enabled it to achieve such rapid growth. The business only takes a fee from clients on successful claims and doesn’t charge set-up costs or contractual lock-ins.

Instead, Brown asserts the focus is to retain clients “by delivering great results with outstanding service” and this focus has paid off – in December, ForrestBrown was awarded the prestigious title of Service Business of the Year at the Startups Awards 2015.

While Brown says building his team and finding professionals with the right mix of expertise and entrepreneurial flair has been a challenge, the future looks bright for ForrestBrown and expansion is in the pipeline.

In March, the start-up announced it would be coming to London with an office location in Moorgate and, having surpassed its growth targets for 2015, Brown says the team are “looking forward to what lies in store in 2016”.

Founders: Steve Bartlett and Dominic McGregor
Founded: November 2014
Website: www.socialchain.com 

Being able to make anything the number one trending topic on Twitter in less than 30 minutes is a big claim, but one that social media marketing agency Social Chain has been able to back up in tests with Buzzfeed and Channel 5’s The Gadget Show.

Founded by young entrepreneurs Steven Bartlett and Dominic McGregor, the Manchester-based company works with social influencers in the UK to control online conversations and generate campaigns for its clients. And what an impressive roster of 30 clients it is, with names including Spotify, Microsoft, Puma, ASOS, Disney, Comedy Central, 20^th Century Fox and Topman. Alongside stellar clients, the numbers speak for themselves: less than two years after launch, Social Chain’s founders describe themselves as one of “the biggest media owners in Europe on social media”, boasting over 200 million people in its network across 300 different social media pages.

The business recently clinched a $2m investment from German talent management firm NVC, which it used to open its first international office in Berlin. After this initial taste for international expansion, Social Chain plans to launch operations in the US by the end of year and is currently in the process of building what it describes as “some pretty amazing tech”…

Founders: Florian Färber and Lorenzo Franzi
Founded: September 2014
Website: www.zipjet.co.uk

Florian Färber and Lorenzo Franzi understand that modern life can be busy –juggling family life, a career and a social life. They started Zipjet with a simple aim: to give people more free time to focus on what matters to them.

Targeting business men, fashionistas and time-poor families with a lot of laundry, Zipjet is an on demand laundry, dry cleaning and ironing service that collects, washes and returns your laundry within 24-hours. Customers simply arrange a convenient pick-up slot on the mobile app or website and the nearest available driver is sent. Unlike competitors, the service doesn’t require its customers to itemise their order – just to chuck it in a laundry bag and await collection. Prices range from £2.20 for a single shirt to £14.50 to wash a fold an 8kg bag of laundry.

Currently only available in central London and Berlin (after launching there in January 2015), Zipjet already has 25,000 customers and is in the process of steadily expanding the area it serves. The firm will be vying for space with a number of other competitors in the London on-demand laundry market (including featured rival Laundrapp) – but by partnering with a number of local facilities, is able to reach a large customer base and keep running costs low. With new functionality just announced, including same-day delivery, the innovative business has big ambitions for the next 12 months…

Founders: Jas Bagniewski, James Fryer, Kuba Wieczorek and Felix Lobkovich
Founded: January 2015 (launched February 2015)
Website: www.evemattress.co.uk

Featured among the top new businesses launched in 2015, eve sleep’s offering will appeal to anyone that appreciates a good night’s rest… so pretty much all of us!

The brainchild of dynamic foursome Jas Bagniewski, James Fryer, Kuba Wieczorek, and Felix Lobkovich, eve was born as a way to disrupt the “archaic traditional mattress industry”.

Bagniewski et al sought to make “super comfy mattresses” available to buy on a platform which sells direct to consumers within “three sleeps”; ridding customers of having to deal with “pushy salespeople and waiting weeks for delivery”. Just over a year since launching the business, the mattress entrepreneurs have achieved these aims and much more.

Having created what they deem to be the world’s most comfortable mattress at a “price that’s fair”, eve has attracted over 10,000 customers to date (including the X Factor finalists), secured £3.5m in external investment, and has swelled to a team of 35.

In fact, the start-up is so confident in its premium quality product – made with memory foam layers and latex – that it even offers customers a 100-night sleep trial, with the option to return if they aren’t completely satisfied.

While the founders say they have had to deal with “copy-cats coming to the market” and cloning the idea, this hasn’t impacted their ambitions for the business. Over the next year, the team plan to invest in advertising, new product development, and expansion into Europe with the ultimate goal to make eve a globally recognised lifestyle brand.

Founder: Ross Bailey
Founded: November 2012 (Launched February 2013)
Website: www.appearhere.co.uk

Appear Here is a name with illustrious Startups pedigree – the pop-up shop rental platform is now on its third appearance in the Startups 100 and at the Startups Awards 2015 took home Venture Funded Business of the Year and our overall prize Simply Business Startups Business of the Year..

Founded by Young Gun Ross Bailey, the online marketplace allows users to easily book short-term retail space at key locations across London and Paris, taking a 15% transaction fee for every booking. The entrepreneur chanced upon the idea when he had difficulty trying to find space to launch his own pop-up shop during the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. Four years later, Appear Here has more than 25,000 brands and entrepreneurs using the platform to find space, more than 1,000 landlords – including Transport for London, Capital and Regional, Hammerson and Land Securities – and 1,500 spaces available across London and Paris.

With nearly $10m investment, thanks to a Series A round backed by Balderton Capital and MMC Ventures, Paris is just the start of the UK firm’s global ambitions to build a worldwide network of “the world’s best retail spaces”. With launch in a third major international city set for  the next few months, of the start-up is also due to introduce a tenant and landlord dashboard on the site to make booking “easier and more transparent”.

Founders: Jerry and Shelley Lawson
Founded: March 2012 (Launched February 2013)
Website: www.frogbikes.com

This small UK start-up is taking on some major established players in the global children’s bike market with a range of lightweight, specially designed and affordable children’s bikes.

After finding most bikes on the market were heavy and poorly designed when trying to find the perfect bikes for their children to learn on, Jerry and Shelley Lawson saw an opportunity to get the ageing industry off its stabilisers. Together they launched Surrey-based Frog Bikes. Every component of the company’s range of bikes is designed specifically for children using “cutting edge scientific research” – from balance bikes, to pedal bikes and road and track models.

Now shipping to nearly 1,000 independent bike stores in 28 countries including the UK, mainland Europe, Canada, South Africa, Hong Kong, Japan and Thailand, it’s not surprising that the company took home Export Business of the Year at the 2015 Startups Awards.

Currently assembled in the Far East, summer 2016 will see the opening of Frog Bikes own factory in Wales, on the back of which it will look to accelerate growth both overseas and in the UK. Grown organically to date and set to turnover an impressive £8m in 2016, this ambitious product start-up has a bright future ahead of it.

Founder: Darren Jobling
Founded: May 2014
Website: www.zerolight.com

Number 23 in last year’s Startups 100, ZeroLight is the brainchild of former racing videogame developer Darren Jobling who spotted the car market’s need for a more sophisticated virtual car showroom.

Using his games industry heritage, the entrepreneur founded Zerolight, a real-time 3D car configurator solution. The innovative software enables dealerships to create a fully interactive showcase of their complete range of models, designs and options – and the user can customise the vehicle of their choosing to any specification and view it from any perspective.

The company’s clients – including Audi AG, Pagani Automobili and two unnamed global mass-market manufacturers – purchase a per-year, per-dealership licence to use the technology for a minimum of three years. Zerolight also offers custom content and technology creation for any of its clients that need a bespoke solution.

2016 is set to be a big year for the business, with the announcement of its two new major clients and a launch into new international markets. Currently set to roll-out its first virtual reality experience in the form of Audi VR, the Startups Awards Tech Business of the Year finalist will continue to expand in the burgeoning field by working with a number of market leaders including Oculus, HTC Vive and Gear VR.

Founders: David Santoro, Alexandra Margolis and James Hind
Founded: February 2014
Website: www.carwow.co.uk

Appearing in the Startups 100 index for the second year in a row is carwow, the start-up seeking to modernise the awkward and antiquated process of buying a new car and making it a more convenient experience for the consumer.

Originally founded as a research site, David Santoro, Alexandra Margolis and James Hind saw an opportunity to take the process out of the showroom and onto the internet. Users can quickly compare cars from rated and approved dealerships by price, location and reviews – removing the need for haggling, while claiming to save an average of £3,600 per purchase. carwow charges only the dealer for the number of sales completed through the platform, with the user able to find the best deals at no extra cost.

After taking total investment to £18.4m thanks to a £12.5m Series B round in January, 2016 has already proved a stellar year for the Holborn-based business, with one million now signed up to the service and £550m in sales for its network of 1,300 dealerships. Last month also saw the platform’s launch in Germany. Claiming to still have no direct competitors, carwow should have no problems fulfilling its ambition of 100 employees by the end of the year and developing a used car marketplace for the site.

Founders: Liam James and Matthew Green
Founded: February 2012 (launched March 2013)
Website: http://theioutlet.com/

Third time’s a charm for The iOutlet as it makes its third consecutive appearance in the esteemed Startups 100 index. Launched in 2013, young founders Liam James and Matthew Green have turned a relatively simple concept into a multi-million pound company with growth on the ascent.

Capitalising on the second hand phone market and the rise in SIM-only contracts, the duo buy in iPhones, smartphones and tablets in bulk, refurbish them where needed, and then sell them on for a discounted price using eBay as their main sales channel. This model effectively gives consumers the same quality but at a much lower cost.

With sales of around 100,000 items per year and customers in over 40 countries, the pair appear to have created a winning business formula with turnover of a whopping £14m for 2015 and almost £2m in profit. These numbers are particularly impressive when you take into account that the business was started with just £5,000 in savings and has yet to raise any external investment.

Naming Sir Richard Branson and Lord Sugar as their business heroes, James and Green originally started The iOutlet to be their own boss and it’s a motive which has paid off. The pair now employ 14 people, have retail outlets alongside their online operations, and have revenue projections of £17.5m for 2016.

A new warehouse is in the pipeline over the coming months along with at least one more retail outlet, and there are also plans to enter into the iMac and MacBook market.