| For their final live stream event of the year Barclays’ High-Growth & Entrepreneur team has joined forces with four exceptional panelists to lift the lid on failure in an open debate at RISE London. The autopsy of any failed business is difficult, especially when it’s your own. Learning from your mistakes and more importantly sharing your experience is extremely difficult but you’re not alone. Join them on Tuesday 14th November for the final event in their 2017 series of #HighGrowthLive. Richard Heggie, Head of High Growth and Entrepreneurs at Barclays will be joined by the following panellists to discuss their failures, the highs the lows and how they’ve shaken off failure to become a success in their own right. This event comes live from London, but you can join in at the Barclays Eagle lab, Jersey Library. |
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Gerald Ratner, former Ratners Group
Gerald Ratner took over the family jewellery chain in the mid 80s, becoming one of Britain’s best known businessmen. He transformed it from 130 stores with sales of £13m to a public company with 2,500 stores and sales of over £1.2bn. By 1990, Ratner’s was the world’s largest jewellery retailer with profits in excess of £120m.
Following a widely reported gaffe in which he compared his products to M&S prawn sandwiches, Gerald was forced to sell the business. Reduced to virtually nothing and shunned by banks and prospective employers, he eventually picked himself up and clawed his way back – first with a health club then with geraldonline. The Internet jewellery business is now the largest in the sector, perhaps presaging a return to the high street.After turning around his fortunes, Gerald talks with typical candour and a great deal of humour about the rollercoaster journey. He even raises a smile when he produces The Sun’s list of the ‘50 biggest mistakes of all time’ – in which his is ranked top! |  | |
Karen Darke, London 2012 Silver Medalist and World Paralympic Champion
Karen Darke is a full-time athlete with the British Paracycling Team, and a keen adventurer. She won a silver medal in the London 2012 Paralympics, was World Paratriathlon Champion in the same year, and a silver medallist in 2013. From a young age Karen was a keen runner, climber and all round outdoor addict. Then, at the age of 21, whilst rock-climbing she fell off a cliff and became paralysed from the chest down. There begins the opening chapter of her first book, If You Fall (O Books, 2006), and the beginning of an extraordinary new life.After her accident, Karen put all her energy into challenging and overcoming her physical and mental barriers. This involved everything from marathons and triathlons, to kayaking, sit-skiing and hand-cycling in some of the most inhospitable places on the planet.One of her greatest triumphs was facing her fear of heights by climbing the kilometre high overhanging precipice of El Capitan, a giant granite rock face in Yosemite National Park, USA. In 2013 she plans to be the first paraplegic woman to sit-ski over 1000km to the Geographic South Pole. Her aim is to raise £1,000,000 for charities which help disabled people, and young people, lead active, positive lives. She is currently cycling from Canada to Mexico down the West coast of the USA.Karen’s second book, Boundless (AKreative, 2012), offers a view of life’s challenges, the profound effects of wilderness, and just what is possible when heart and mind are set to something. Karen will provide us with a different perspective on how to handle any challenge that life may throw at you. |  | |
Damian Kimmelman, Co-founder & CEO, Duedil
Damian Kimmelman is co-founder & CEO of DueDil. In 2014, he was named “International Entrepreneur of the Year” by former UK Secretary of State for Business Vince Cable and Tech City News, and was included in the London Evening Standard’s “1,000 Most Influential Londoners”.Damian is also a co-founder of Founders Pledge, a not-for-profit social giving organisation, which he helped start. He blogs for the Medium and tweets @duediler.Dubbed as Britains answer to Bloomberg, while DueDil is Kimmelman’s best-known venture, it’s hardly his first. The New Yorker has a tinkering, entrepreneurial nature that has seen him dabble in a number of fields. It was the failure of one of his companies that gave him his ‘Eureka’ moment leading him to start Duedil. |  | | Alexei Levene, Co-Founder, DesolenatorThe common thread in Alexei’s life has been about creating and nurturing divergent ideas and teams that have the potential to bring about positive change. Alexei kicked off his career working in the nascent Supply Chain technology space with US based i2 Technologies. After stints in a number of Software solution companies, Alexei struck out on his own moving to Poland and building a small team offering consultancy to the industry. Later Alexei co-founded the Innovation Consultancy UnfroZenmind based in Paris. After returning to the UK Alexei teamed up with colleagues to co-found the award winning Abundance, an FCA regulated Crowdfunding company that has to date brought in £40m from the public to fund over 20 renewable energy projects in the UK. Having successfully fundraised and established the team Alexei moved on from the venture to spend a year working at the South India based Kanthari. Basing himself in India established the social business ixspark, an innovation and product development lab enabling social innovation initiatives and NGO, corporate and government collaborations. The patented solar powered desalination device Desolenator was born out of this lab and was spun out to the UK since winning awards from NASA, Singularity University, Pitch at the Palace and many more. |
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