Awards

Lawrence Jones has been named North West Entrepreneur of the Year at EN Magazine's tenth annual Entrepreneur of the Year awards. Jones, who was last year named the North West's Technology Entrepreneur of the Year, has built UKFast over the past 12 years from a tiny start-up in a two-man office, to a business worth £80m, with a team of more than 140.

In 2009, UKFast entered the list in the top 50, at number 38 - a tremendous achievement to mark our 10th anniversary. For the third year running, we are proud to have been named in the Sunday Times Microsoft Tech Track 100 list for 2011, placing fourth in the North West. The list, published on 18th September 2011, ranks Britain's top 100 private tech companies with the fastest growing sales.

UKFast is once again named as one of the most fun and friendly places to work by the Great Places to Work Institute in 2011. In the prestigious list, published by the Financial Times, UKFast was named 2nd in the Most Fun and Friendly category, ranking 21st overall. UKFast is the only company with less than 1,000 employees in the North West to feature in the list, and one of only seven IT companies. In addition to topping the Most Fun and Friendly category in 2010, we achieved fifth for Learning and Development.

UKFast is proud to receive the GM Chamber Innovation award in recognition of the internal software Orpheus. Designed by the in-house research and development team, Orpheus incorporates systems for each department and allows every UKFast team member to maximise efficiency, streamline processes and free up time to help clients. Being a company with innovation at its core, UKFast is delighted to see the hard work and ingenuity of their R&D team celebrated.

Voted by our peers in the internet industry, the UK's Trade Association for providers of Internet services (ISPA) crowned UKFast with multiple awards for excellence in hosting, including Best Business Host, Best Business Customer Service, Best Dedicated Hosting, Best Hosting Provider and Corporate Social Responsibility.

Despite the tough economic climate, UKFast has shown consistent growth since its inception in 1999. Now with more than 140 staff and a turnover of £16m in 2011, UKFast's exceptional growth has been recognised with a places in Deloitte's Technology Fast 50 and Fast 500 - the fastest growing companies in the UK and across 24 countries in Europe, Middle East and Africa.

Lawrence Jones, CEO of UKFast was awarded EN Magazine's prestigious Technology Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2010. The judges were impressed with the leadership and innovation demonstrated by Lawrence in developing UKFast into one of the UK's fastest growing technology companies.

UKFast has been named the IT Employer of the Year at the IT Industry Awards for 2010. We see this as huge recognition for a company that has expanded from a 2 person operation in 1999 to a growing business that now employs over 130 people. On the night the judges said that our approach to training, development and innovation has enabled us to deliver "outstanding performance to clients while maintaining dedicated, motivated and talented staff."

A distinguished panel of judges from the Manchester Evening News, the Royal Bank of Scotland, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Pinsent Masons awarded UKFast the highly regarded Business of the Year accolade in 2008. UKFast was up against very strong competition in our category of Manchester firms with revenues under £10 million, to take the highly prized MEN Award.