Getting into the European startup scene and want to hear what’s going on from the people who know it best? Here’s a list of some of the most influential tech entrepreneurs in Europe, in no particular order.
Robert Gentz – CEO at Zalando
Twitter handle: @RMGentz
Robert Gentz founded his company in 2008 at the tender age of 23. Zalando is an e-commerce platform mainly for shoes. The venture is valued at 6.8 billion euros and employs more than 5,000 people. In 2014 Zalando went IPO. If you’re interested in e-commerce, make sure to check out what he has to Tweet.
Daniel Ek – Founder & CEO at Spotify
Twitter Handle: @eldsjal
Daniel Ek is leading one of the most successful tech startups. Spotify was founded in 2006 and is now valued at $5.7 billion. Check out his Tweets for all things music tech.
Michael Acton – Founder & CEO at Mind Candy
Twitter Handle: @acton
Michael Acton founded the British entertainment company Mind Candy in 2004 with their flagship game Moshi Monsters. He’s on a mission to build the largest entertainment brand in the world for this new digital generation of kids.
Richard Branson – Virgin entrepreneur
Twitter Handle: @richardbranson
Richard Branson is a bit of a standard on any Tweeting entrepreneur’s follow list. Just in case you need reminding, he’s the guy that founded the Virgin Group, which holds more than 400 companies. He started his company-spree at the age of 16.
Elizabeth Varley – Co-founder TechHub
Twitter Handle: @evarley
Elizabeth Varley co-founded TechHub “a network bringing together the global technology startup community, in
London, Riga, Manchester, Bucharest, Swansea, Berlin, Bangalore and soon many other cities around the world.”
Nick D’Aloisio – Founder & CEO at Summly
Twitter Handle: @nickdaloisio
Nick is one of the youngest self-made millionaires in Europe. He was only 17 when he developed Summly — a new summarisation app. In 2013 he sold Summly to Yahoo for $30 million dollars. He’s now building the Yahoo News Digest.
Peter Arvai – Co-Founder of Prezi
Twitter Handle: @peterarvai
Peter Arvai is a Swedish-Hungarian co-founder of Prezi in 2009, the creative web-based presentation tool. Expect the occasional multi-lingual Tweet (he’s fluent in English, Swedish, Hungarian and Japanese).
Frédéric Mazzella – Founder of BlaBlaCar
Twitter Handle: @mazaic
Frédéric Mazzella basically just wanted to get home to his family for Christmas but didn’t have a car. So he did what any good entrepreneur would do. He founded a company to sort it out for everyone else who has the same problem.
Martha Lane Fox – Founder of Lastminute.com
Twitter Handle: @Marthalanefox
She co-founded Lastminute.com, and she happens to be the youngest female member of the British House of Lords. You may refer to her as Baroness Lane-Fox of Soho.
Brent Hoberman – Founder and CEO of Lastminute.com
Twitter Handle: @brenthoberman
Brent Hoberman was the other co-founder of lastminute.com, which he and Martha built from his London flat. He’s also founded mydeco.com in 2007, made.com and is a non-executive chairman at wayn.com.