Scotland’s entrepreneurial prowess will be on display at a dinner at the Doubletree by Hilton hotel in Glasgow on 30 November when the Entrepreneur of the Year Awards are presented in front of around 500 guests.
Staged this year by Entrepreneurial Scotland in association with professional services firm Deloitte and media partner The Herald, the awards are Scotland's longest-standing annual awards for growth-oriented entrepreneurs.
The awards fall into two categories: Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year, and Entrepreneur of the Year. This year’s judges included Mike Loggie, founder of the Saltire Energy oil services group, who won the Entrepreneur of the Year award last year.
Sandy Kennedy, chief executive of Entrepreneurial Scotland said: “Being inspired and encouraged by the experience of others who have been there before is vital for our emerging and growing entrepreneurial leaders.
“Now, perhaps more than ever before, is a time for the entrepreneurial to lead our organisations to success, creating jobs and building our economy as we look to create the most entrepreneurial society in the world."
Our preview of the short-listed candidates in each category concludes with the four nominees for Entrepreneur of the Year.
Alan McLeish, QTS Group, Strathaven
Alan McLeish has built QTS Group into one of the UK’s most successful rail contracting businesses after moving into forestry work as a young man when his hopes of becoming a professional footballer were dashed by an injury.
QTS developed out of the Quality Tree Surgeons business that Mr McLeish started in 1991 with a £300 loan from his mother, which he used to buy a chainsaw.
The business has grown into a £70 million turnover operation which provide services such as vegetation management and fencing for a customer base that includes Network Rail, utilities and local authorities.
Richard Slater, Partner and Head of Private Markets for Deloitte in Scotland, said Mr McLeish has taken on the big players in a particularly competitive industry and done exceptionally well.
He added: “Alan’s commitment to business ethics; sport, demonstrated by QTS’s many partnerships; the environment; and charitable causes is commendable.”
Dr James S Milne, Balmoral Group, Aberdeen
Dr James Milne, often known as Jim, has been honing his entrepreneurial skills for decades since starting in business aged 16 selling cars which he refurbished. A trained agricultural engineer, he moved into the oil services business after spotting the potential to make machinery parts from glass fibre. After his first oil services went into receivership amid the fall out from problems in Iran and Nigeria in the 1970s, Mr Milne started Balmoral in 1980 with five employees. He has gone on to lead the company to huge success on the global stage as a provider of design and manufacturing services for clients in sectors ranging from oil and gas to environmental engineering. He was awarded a CBE in 1994 and received an honorary doctorate from Aberdeen’s Robert Gordon University in 1999.
Mr Slater said: “Balmoral is one of the most-respected businesses of its type in the world and Jim is one of Scotland’s true entrepreneurs. His story certainly isn’t one for the faint-hearted and is typified by the ‘never-say-die’ attitude which has got him where he is today.”
Jim Rafferty, T.O.M. Vehicle Rental, Airdrie
Judged UK Apprentice of the Year during his training as a motor vehicle technician in the 1980s, Jim Rafferty cut his teeth in the trade in a Ford garage in Lanarkshire. He developed T.O.M Vehicle Rental out of an MOT station which he founded in 1991 and has masterminded a programme of expansion supported by acquisitions which has helped the business become one of the fastest growing companies in the UK. With operations stretching from Aberdeen to London, the business operates a fleet of more than 12,000 commercial vehicles and generates annual revenues of around £200m. The company underlined its growth ambitions earlier this month by opening a depot in Birmingham.
Mr Slater said: “T.O.M. has stayed true to its core principles of delivering what customers want and thinking differently about how it can provide them with optimum support. That philosophy has kept the company motoring through two recessions, while others have fallen by the wayside.”
Billy Walker, BenRiach Distillery Company, Edinburgh
Billy Walker turned heads in the global drinks industry in April with the £285m sale of the BenRiach Distillery Company business, which he launched with an investment of less than £1m. The sale provided a stunning endorsement of the faith Mr Walker had shown in the potential for single malts to win a big following. This led him to restart production from the mothballed BenRiach distllery on Speyside, which he bought with two South African business partners in 2002. Mr Walker grew the business into a £40m turnover operation after going on to breathe new life into the GlenDronach and Glenglassaugh distilleries in Aberdeenshire.
“It’s obvious that Billy lives and breathes whisky,” said Mr Slater. “In his role at BenRiach, he has done a great service to Scotland’s most famous industry in restoring a well-known brand to its previous glory, while pursuing a very different distribution strategy to his much-larger competitors in the market."
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