The UKYPE award celebrates entrepreneurial ability within publishing, and strengthens creative leadership, networking, and capacity building in the UK publishing industry.  It also focuses on strengthening the engagement between the UK and publishing in emerging markets, and seeks to further stimulate the development of the UK publishing industry in an international business context. 

UKYPE 09 finalists during their study tour in India.

The aim is to find the most talented young entrepreneurs working in the UK’s publishing industry and give them the chance to find out more about what is happening out there, by becoming part of the British Council’s international network of young creative entrepreneurs. 

UKYPE is a British Council award, co-sponsored by The London Book Fair, and supported by the Publishers’ Association and BookBrunch. 

UKYPE will take place for the fourth time in 2010. It was awarded to Clare Christian (The Friday Project) for the first time in 2007, to Emma Hayley (SelfMadeHero) at London Book Fair in April 2008, and to Davy Nougarede (Heavy Entertainment) in 2009. 

UKYPE 08 winner, Emma Hayley from SelfMadeHero.

After an open application process, a judging panel chaired by Andrew Franklin (Profile Books) short-listed six finalists to compete for the award and to take part in a 10-day study tour of South Africa’s publishing industry. The group will visit Cape Town and Johannesburg in early March 2010, meeting with senior figures and fellow young entrepreneurs, and learning, first-hand, how the South African booktrade works. The aim of the study tour is both to challenge the finalists’ traditional perspectives on publishing and to provide them with the resources (networking and trade development opportunities) to understand and engage with the South African market. Upon their return to London, the finalists will be interviewed again by a judging panel and assessed on their experience, understanding, and ability to spot opportunities in the South African publishing sector.    

South Africa has been chosen as the host country for UKYPE 10 to coincide with it being the country of honour at this year’s London Book Fair. 

   

The six UKYPE 10 finalists are: 

Daniel Crewe (Profile Books).

Daniel Crewe
Associate Publisher, Profile Books
W www.profilebooks.com
Daniel is Associate Publisher at Profile Books, where he’s part of the company’s management team and electronic management team. His job involves helping to decide on the company’s acquisitions, managing a team of two editors, and signing up and publishing around 12-15 books each year. 
Profile Books was founded in 1996 to publish stimulating non-fiction. They publish across a wide range of subjects, including current affairs, travel, history, philosophy, psychology, and business, and publish all The Economist books. In 2003, they published their first million-copy seller, Eats, Shoots & Leaves. They have been awarded the Small Publisher of the Year award in 1999, 2004, and 2006. 

  

Julia Kingsford (Foyles)


Julia Kingsford
Head of Marketing, Foyles
W www.foyles.co.uk
Julia joined Foyles in 2005, working initially on their events programme, alongside marketing & promotion. Her brief soon expanded to include broader marketing work, and in 2008 she was made Head of Marketing, and given a place on the company’s executive management team. She now works very closely with the CEO and the rest of the management team, shaping the bookstore’s development.
Foyles’ is one of the UK’s most famous bookshops, founded in 1903 by the brothers William and Gilbert Foyle. Their flagship store at 113-119 Charing Cross offers a huge range of fiction and non-fiction, and runs an active programme of literary and publishing activities. Recently, they have opened new stores in St Pancras Station, the South Bank’s Royal Hall, and Westfield shopping centre in West London. 

Anna Lewis (CompletelyNovel.com)

Anna Lewis
Chief Operating Officer, CompletelyNovel.com
W www.completelynovel.com
Anna founded CompletelyNovel in 2008, an interactive platform that helps readers and writers with niche interests/audiences to find each other more easily. This global publishing platform seeks to break down unnecessary barriers between content, distribution, and consumers. She believes that by storing content digitally, and then coupling it with digital, on-demand and traditional distribution, CompletelyNovel can improve the effectiveness of the supply chain. The platform intends to pave the way for content creators and publishers to extend the initial reach of their texts, as well as to facilitate them place their content in its most suitable supply channel. 

Rachael Ogden (Inpress).

Rachael Ogden
Managing Director, Inpress
W www.inpressbooks.co.uk
Inpress is a sales and marketing agency, representing over 40 independent publishers from across the UK. Upon joining Inpress, Rachael rebranded and relaunched the company, and relocated it from Ealing to Newcastle. She also increased the number of publishers they worked with, and started developing new digital services (e-books, e-marketing), and managed a series of showcase events. Inpress manages the warehousing of their publishers’ stock in London, and employs a team of eight freelance sales agents who sell their titles into bookshops in the UK, Europe and Australia. 

Mark Searle (Elliot & Thompson).

Mark Searle
Publisher, Elliot & Thompson
W www.eandtbooks.com
Mark has over nine years of experience in publishing, having worked for large organisations like Pearson Education, Pan Macmillan and Anova Books. In 2005, he was recruited to set up the books division of magazine publisher Think Publishing, and later devised a joint venture agreement with Pan Macmillan for the imprint Think Books. In 2008, he was recruited to run Elliot & Thompson. He has been responsible for revolutionising the business, increasing its turnover significantly, and creating the infrastructure for the company to grow further in the future.
Elliot & Thompson is a small independent house that specialises in trade non-ficion, as well as bespoke books for institutional clients. 

Gavin Weale (Live Futures).

Gavin Weale
Managing Director, Live Futures
W www.live-magazine.co.uk
Gavin began his career as a journalist and web editor before joining Livity, a marketing agency in its first year of operation. Within six months he had become a full-time creative for Livity and a mentor on Live Magazine, one of Livity’s first projects. In 2004, Live Magazine became its own non-profit company, Live Futures Ltd, and Gavin became its Managing Director. Since then, Gavin has overseen Live Futures’ development into a profitable social enterprise which employs almost 20 staff, publishes 5 titles a year, and has helped over 75 young people into education and/or employment. Gavin has grown Live magazine into London’s best known youth-run publication, and has also taken a central role in the launch of Penguin Books’ Spinebreakers teenage writers’ initiative, and overseen the development of a flagship audience engagement platform for the BBC.

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