John Paleomylites

JOHN-PALEOMYLITES

Net Worth : £60 millions

John Paleomylites, 51, started price comparison site Beatthatquote.com in 2005, five years after he sold his first business for £40m. Not many entrepreneurs have the kind of business idea that translates into first year profits of £100,000 and even fewer can go on to expect second year profits of £3m, on a turnover of £10m.

BeatThatQuote generates leads for financial services, such as mortgages, loans and bank accounts, finding consumers the “best deal” based on their individual profile and saving them time by comparing and applying for these services online.

He set up his first business, a data-security firm called JCP TrustBase, in 1994. In January 2000, he sold it to global IT corporation Sun Microsystems, for £40m.
The company was financed on a £40,000 limit on a credit card, which funded the marketing spend, and a £500,000 guarantee to the bank, to aid cashflow.

In August 2005 Paleomylites moved the business to a small, serviced office in London’s Kentish Town, with three members of staff recruited through his network of contacts, and at the beginning of 2006 he appointed Adalbert as sales director. He launched Beatthatquote in 2005 and, by last year, the Kentish Town-based business had £9m turnover and £3m profits. On its track record, it is easily worth £50m and we add £10m for the JCP proceeds.

His company, BeatThatQuote.com (BTQ), has just been named the NatWest Startups Awards’ “Business of the Year.” At the end of its second year, the online marketing company, which enables consumers to search the web for the best deals on mortgages, loans and credit cards and other products, is set to announce profits of £3m from a turnover of £10m. Paleomylites spent over a year researching at home, preparing for battle, yet despite his previous success he started the company on a £40,000 shoestring credit limit and its been self-financing since. In 2006 the company posted revenues of around £10M, and projects revenues of around £28M for 2007. In April 2008, BeatThatQuote.com was voted number one in the ‘Start-Ups Top 100′ new companies.

It’s more about the challenge than the money, says John Paleomylites, managing director of BeatThatQuote.com, his second company:

“Having more money to spend wouldn’t make any material difference to my lifestyle. You need to prove to yourself that you’ve still got the juice and can do it again.”