BU Research Blog

Bournemouth University proudly sponsored the Entrepreneur of the Year award for another year. The application and judging process culminated in an awards ceremony and Gala Dinner for 530+ guests at the Lighthouse in Poole on 29th November, hosted by actress and impressionist Debra Stephenson.

The evening had a Bond theme to celebrate the ‘007th’ year that the Dorset Chamber of Commerce & Industry has organised the awards and the 50th anniversary of the James Bond character.

The Entrepreneur of the Year category attracted one of the highest number of entries. The applicants were diverse and covered a broad and varied range of businesses. The judging panel had the enjoyable, yet extremely challenging, task of narrowing the list down to just three finalists.

The judges were Professor Roger Palmer the Dean of the Business School, Professor Dean Patton the Head of the Centre for Entrepreneurship and Mark Painter the Business Development Manager for the Business School.  The three deserving finalists were Phil Whitehurst of Active Research, Duncan Cook of 3 Sided Cube and Paul Woods of Astute. Paul Woods was the eventual worthy winner of the Entrepreneur of the Year award. 

Mark, Roger and Dean were joined at the Gala Dinner by Tim Lee, a non-Executive Director of BU, the three finalists and their guests.

More information regarding the Dorset Business Awards can be found at www.dorsetbusinessawards.co.uk