Sad day for Manchester tech as Wakelet appoints administrators

Manchester tech business Wakelet has filed for administration at the High Court in Manchester.

Lawyers from law firm JMW were instructed to formally inform the court on the 8th of April, a process which gave the company breathing space and protection from creditors, but on the 15th of April Leonard Curtis were appointed as administrators.

TheBusinessDesk.com understands the company, founded by popular entrepreneur Jamil Khalil, a former engineer at Airbus, with the support of ANS founder Scott Fletcher, has moved out of offices in the Bright Building at Manchester Science Park, where it had a lease on a 7,000 sq ft office.

It is understood the remainder of the business has moved to new premises in the city centre.

In January 2025 Khalil registered a charge over the assets of Wakelet Limited, and in February set up a new company, Reviven Limited.

According to the register of directors at Companies House, Wakelet Limited currently has no directors as Jamil Khalil, Scott Fletcher, and Carlo Nizam all resigned last week. Ohad Finkelstein resigned in February 2025. 

Its last set of accounts to the end of 2023, unaudited and abbreviated, show a decline in the cash at hand from £5m to just short of £2m. 

The business aimed to link different social media accounts for clients and was created to solve the problem of how to save, organise and share a collection of links in a visually-engaging way.

TheBusinessDesk.com has also had sight of a document entitled Project Siren, inviting interest in rescuing a business that sounds very much like Wakelet, produced by proposed joint administrators Leonard Curtis, which reveals that the business had turnover for the 11 months to November 2024 of just £9k and had 23 employees.

“The Proposed Joint Administrators are seeking parties interested in the business and assets of a Company that trades as an all-in-one content curation and collaboration platform,” the document says, inviting prospective investors to sign a non-disclosure agreement to see more details, by the 27th of February 2025.

A spokesperson for Leonard Curtis acknowledged the request for further comment and their response will be added to this story.

The last shareholders register, filed at the start of January 2025, for Wakelet Limited includes a remarkable list of personalities spanning the worlds of sport, politics and business.

The names include current West Ham player Michail Antonio, as well as international ex-footballers England’s Rio Ferdinand, Joleon Lescott and Aaron Lennon and former Scotland stars Craig Conway and Barry Bannon; the boxer Conor Benn; and former politicians Chuka Umunna and Sayeeda Warsi.

Entrepreneurs holding shares in the ambitious tech business include the original publishers of Angry Birds, Chris Byatte and Joe Wee; property developers Tom Bloxham and George Downing, who held the second largest stake; several members of the Kamani family from fast fashion business Boohoo; as well as tech entrepreneur Scott Fletcher, its biggest backer. 

Wakelet claimed to have more than a million individual and business users, including prestigious institutions like Harvard University, international sports teams FC Barcelona and Atlanta Hawks, and blue chip companies such as Airbus and Experian.

Should this administration process fail to revive the business it will be a bitter blow to Manchester’s aspirations to create a tech business of scale. 

When Wakelet moved into the Manchester technology centre in 2018 Chris Oglesby, chairman of Bruntwood SciTech, said: “Wakelet is one of the most exciting tech businesses in the North, with the clear potential to be a global player in online content curation.”

TheBusinessDesk.com has contacted Jamil Khalil for comment, but he has not responded.