Digital money transfer service WorldRemit has clinched first place in the 2015 Deloitte UK Technology Fast 50.

The independent ranking of the UK’s fastest growing technology companies found that London-headquartered WorldRemit had recorded an average four-year revenue growth of 20,385 per cent.

Founded in 2010 by Ismail Ahmed with Richard Igoe and Catherine Wines, the online service offers transfers to more than 125 destinations across Europe, Asia, Africa, Australasia and the Americas through a network of correspondents, banks and telcos. The platform allows customers to instantly send money abroad to friends and family, using only a smartphone, tablet or computer.

Ahmed, also WorldRemit’s chief executive, said: “I wanted to achieve two things: first of all, to offer a remittance service that wasn’t slow and inconvenient to use and didn’t require customers to go to a store and fill out forms. Secondly, I wanted to build a business that could efficiently comply with anti-money laundering regulations. WorldRemit achieves both those aims.”

Overall, the Deloitte UK Technology Fast 50 companies recorded an average four-year growth rate of 1,883 per cent, generating £820 million in total annual revenues for the year 2014/15 and employing more than 7,400 people.

A survey of the firms’ CEOs by Deloitte also found that one-third of respondents identified a lack of new talent as the single biggest threat to the continued growth of the UK technology sector over the next 12 months, far more so than the economic climate, access to capital or increased competition from larger companies (each cited by one in ten).

In terms of expansion, North America was seen as offering the biggest opportunity over the next three years (66 per cent), followed by Western Europe (61 per cent). Some three quarters of respondents already generated revenue outside of the UK, including 60 per cent from the USA (up from 51 per cent last year), and 55 per cent from the Euro area (down from 69 per cent in 2014).

David Cobb, lead partner for the Deloitte UK Technology Fast 50, observed: “The majority of the Fast 50 entrants have already been successful on the international stage. With this in mind, and clear indications of further growth ambitions, it appears that the UK technology startup scene is in rude health and full of confidence in its own potential in global markets.”

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