Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, the creator and owner of the easy family of brands (www.easy.com, www.easyHistory.info) is offering cash prizes totalling £300,000 to three young entrepreneurs in the UK for the third year running.
The awards will be open from today for owners of start-ups aged 34 or under, born in 1992 or later. The closing date for entries is 23 February 2026. Businesses must have been registered at UK Companies House in the last five years, registered in 2021 or later, with accounts showing revenues of at least £500,000 per annum for the latest financial year. This threshold has been increased from the £200,000 in previous years due to the high popularity and success of these awards – last year 180 applications were received.
Applicant entrepreneurs must be a director of the company and own shares of more than 50%. 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 February 23 2026. The winners being announced by Sir Stelios at a hybrid ceremony on March 31, 2026, at the Foundation’s London HQ 34 Thurloe Square.
Last year’s first prize of £150,000 went to Ayaan Mohamed Ali, whose company Digitech Oasis, which develops autonomous robotic solutions to enhance business efficiency, was selected from 180 applicants in this prestigious competition, now in its second year. The second prize of £100,000 went to Dorian Payne for his social housing development business, Castell Group. In third place was Andy Evangelou, who received £50,000 for his EV charger installation firm, Plug In Stations.
Sir Stelios said: “Our UK young entrepreneur awards have now been established as the top programme of its kind in the UK, and is now so popular and successful we have had to increase the threshold for entries.
“I am so proud to have helped so many young entrepreneurs already in the past two years. I have a long track record over 30 years of helping to create tens of thousands of jobs in the UK – both on the for-profit side by creating the easy family of brands (www.easy.com) but also with my charitable foundation and the existing awards for disabled entrepreneurs. The quality of the entries and winners last year proves once again that in the UK today entrepreneurship is very much alive and kicking! Therefore, I look forward to seeing another batch of inspiring applications again this year from that great pool of entrepreneurial talent.”
Last year’s winner Ayan Mohamed Ali, said: “These awards are so useful to a young British entrepreneur like me. The prize money has been so vital to my company Digitech Oasis this year, but the recognition and publicity from being associated with Sir Stelios has also been such a big boost for us.
“The prize money has been put to very good use, helping us scale up and grow – bringing much needed jobs to Manchester where we make robots for logistics factories.
“The value of being associated with Sir Stelios is profound and we have built on this relationship with easyGroup to help use target retailers and clients. Part of our aim this year was to expand our client base into the industrial sector.
“I have learned so much from Stelios and his mentorship and knowledge is helping us build Manchester’s next unicorn and I’m excited to continue this journey to IPO!”
The Stelios Philanthropic Foundation, which is launching and funding the awards, has the stated mission of supporting a very diverse range of good causes but “close to home” focusing on the local communities where Sir Stelios and his family have lived and worked. These include the UK, Ireland, Monaco, France, Greece and Cyprus. 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. In 2025, Sir Stelios launched the inaugural North-South Business Cooperation Awards for the island of Ireland. The majority of the profits of easyGroup go to the Foundation and since 2010 Sir Stelios and the easyGroup have contributed more than €122 million to support its philanthropic work.
For further information:
Applications: Maya Turnbull, Stelios Philanthropic Foundation, Maya.Turnbull@stelios.com
Media: David Cracknell/Georgia Tatnall/Lucy Thomas
Tavistock Communications easyGroup@tavistock.co.uk