Leading disability charity Leonard Cheshire and Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, creator and owner of the easy family of brands including easyJet (see www.easyHistory.info) and founder and president of the Stelios Philanthropic Foundation, are proud to launch the Stelios Awards for Disabled Entrepreneurs in the UK 2025 now in their 17th year.
The awards will be open from 3 April 2025 for business owners who are registered disabled in the UK. The closing date for entries is Friday 16 May 2025 no later than 5pm. Businesses must have been registered at UK Companies House with accounts showing revenues of at least £100,000 per year.
Applicant entrepreneurs must be a director of the company and own at least 50% of shares. The overall winner will win a prize of £150,000 to invest in their business, with a second prize of £100,000 and third prize of £50,000.
Applications are via a downloadable form from www.stelios.foundation and emailed to maya.turnbull@stelios.com by 5pm on Friday 16th May 2025. The winners being announced by Sir Stelios at a ceremony via Zoom on Friday 13th June 2025.
Since the awards started in 2006 a grand total of £1,850,000 has been donated by Sir Stelios and his foundation to disabled entrepreneurs recognising the exceptional achievements of disabled entrepreneurs who have set up their own company in the UK and excel in their chosen business field.
The Stelios Philanthropic Foundation which is launching and funding the award has the stated mission of supporting a very diverse range of good causes but “close to home” i.e., in the local communities that Sir Stelios and his family have lived and worked and of course the UK is one of them. The foundation has been running very successful similar entrepreneur’s awards in Greece and Cyprus supporting job creation in the local economies for many years. The majority of the profits of easyGroup go to the Foundation.
Full details on eligibility:
https://www.leonardcheshire.org/get-support/working/stelios-awards-disabled-entrepreneurs. Any questions, please email SteliosAward@leonardcheshire.org
Applications: Maya Turnbull, Event Coordinator, The Stelios Philanthropic Foundation, maya.turnbull@stelios.com.
Media: David Cracknell/Lulu Bridges/Georgia Tatnall/Lucy Thomas, Tavistock Communications, easyGroup@tavistock.co.uk.
To download the application form please click here.
