Entrepreneur launches four online start-ups
BUSINESSWOMAN Lorna Davidson, who sold field sales business Tactical Solutions for a headline figure of £24m in 2011, has launched a group of four start-up businesses – all of which she plans to build and sell within three years.
Ms Davidson set up and ran Tactical Solutions for 10 years before selling the business, which employed 320 full-time staff, to listed company St Ives Group.
Speaking at a Women in Business Lunch, hosted by accountancy firm Hurst in Manchester, she said: “I got to the point where I was ready for the next big challenge. Running Tactical Solutions was fantastic but selling it was the best ever, it was a platform to tell everyone about something you have built and grown.”
Ms Davidson officially left the Chester-based business last September and has since set up and self-funded The Mothership Group, an umbrella for four different start-up businesses – all of which she says need to be profitable within their first six months of trading.
“Having been hooked on the sale process, we are driven by selling the businesses within three years – we had our exit strategy before we started,” she said.
Two of the businesses are trading: Venture 13 creates online communities and platforms to collect data and advertise on. MyPet.guru is the first of these and already has 35,000 followers and more than 5,000 unique visitors.
Meanwhile, Red Wigwam is an online recruitment site for temporary staff that uses technology and remote teams to vet candidates.
In development are, Pop It Up, which Ms Davidson says will bring online retail to the high street, and My Perfect Shop, which will be a virtual online sales team for independent retailers.
Based at Baltic Triangle in Liverpool, the group has eight equity owners on the board, with each having responsibility for one of the businesses and a discipline across each of the others.
“They are all very different businesses but they pool our strengths as a team. They are all using technology as a solution and lots of data.”
