Innovator of the Year Awards: London

For the final round of The Spectator’s Economic Innovator of the Year Awards, our kind sponsors, Investec, hosted us at their offices on Gresham Street, London. We met 11 finalists for lunch — out of a record total of 176 entries across the whole of the UK — to pitch their ventures to our distinguished panel of judges.

Our finalists are: UpCircle Beauty, Elvie, Ultromics, Silverstream, eConsult Health, Itaconix, Thought Machine, Recycleye, Project Etopia and Housekeep.The judges; Matthew Robinson who works in Private Equity with ICG;Eva-Maria Dimitriadis CEO of Conduit Connect, and finally Kate Gribbon and Michelle White from Investec. We hope all the companies we meet gain from the networking opportunities, benefit from the accolade of being selected as finalists and enjoy the buzz, the conversation and the lunch. We hope Spectator readers and podcast listeners also enjoy following the search for this year’s ultimate winners to be announced at the gala dinner on the 11th November – and will take a few minutes to explore the finalists' websites and products.