Piers Linney

Piers Linney is an entrepreneur and investor with a professional background in the City. He has broad experience of the challenges that face growth businesses as a founder, adviser, director and investor.

Piers is a well-known champion of entrepreneurship and growth businesses, and is best known as a former Dragon on BBC Dragons’ Den and as a Channel 4 Secret Millionaire, which was filmed inside a Young Offenders’ Institution. Piers qualified as a lawyer specialised in corporate finance and venture capital in the City before joining the investment banking team at Credit Suisse. He left the city to start a dotcom business and became the CEO of a corporate finance business raising funds for technology start-ups and SMEs before becoming a partner at a hedge fund specialising in providing structured debt and equity.

Piers has founded several technology and communication businesses and has won a range of entrepreneurship awards, including Entrepreneur of the Year at the inaugural EYM sponsored Black British Business Awards. He sat on the Cabinet Office SME Panel and the Board of TechUK, and is a trustee of Nesta, the UK’s leading innovation foundation with a £450m endowment, which provides him with unique insights into the future of economics, business and work. Piers is a Non-Executive Director of the government-owned British Business Bank, which aims to unlock capital for UK SMEs and which has facilitated over £12bn of financing.

Piers has been recognised as one of the top 100 most influential Black Britons and as a leading ethnic minority executive by The Financial Times. He is also an advocate for diversity and inclusion in the workplace and on company boards.

Piers provides practical advice to entrepreneurs and business-owners with growth ambitions through his #ScaleUp initiative across a range of social media channels.

In 2018 I Piers co-founded world-leading mountain bike brand Atherton Bikes with a team comprised of three world-championship winning elite athlete siblings, leading material scientists and product designers. In 2023 he co-founded Implement AI, a next technology partner for businesses of all sizes to understand and implement AI.

Although bespoke talks are often requested, Piers's keynotes typically focused on:

Personal journey
From a Lancashire mill town and failing his 11+ to law and investment banking at the highest level in the City and BBC Dragons’ Den.

Scaling up your business
Business change, growth, scaling up your business and its impact. See Piers's five factors for growth below.

Artificial intelligence (AI), technology and the future
The impact of artificial intelligence on the economy, business operations, enterprise, competition, employment, skills and society as we enter an age of exponential change.

Piers is a co-founder of Implement AI. and co-host of leading UK AI for business podcast, The AI-assisted Organisation.

The future of employment and skills based on his experience as a trustee of the UK's largest innovation agency, Nesta.

Diversity and inclusion
Personal experience and impact on business, society and social mobility built on his work as a charitable founder and with Sky.

Panels and Q&As

Piers well-know for his participation on panels and for his open, honest and accessible Q&A sessions,which are a well-received component of many of his engagements.

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