BORN OUT OF THE CRISIS

EVERY Thursday night for a year, the founders of Funding Circle gathered in each other’s kitchens to discuss plans for a new internet lender.

Samir Desai, James Meekings and Andrew Mullinger, friends from their days at Oxford University, realised that after the financial crisis, businesses were not getting support from banks. ‘You just read all over the papers how there were good, strong businesses, not being able to access finance to grow,’ Meekings said.

They set up a new kind of business in 2010, letting savers lend money to companies, without a bank in the middle.