26 June 2007

Ernst & Young has awarded its prestigious Ernst & Young 2007 London Region Entrepreneur of The Year Technology and Communication award to Sean Phelan, founder of Multimap. Phelan picked up the trophy at the awards ceremony at the London Hilton Metropole, in recognition of his success as a leading internet entrepreneur and innovator.

Multimap provides mapping and location-based services, delivering more online maps, point to point driving directions and geo-spatial (‘where’s my nearest?’) searches to more companies than any other supplier in Europe. Under Sean’s leadership, Multimap has grown from a back-room start-up to a £10 million global company with over eight million unique users and 115 employees based in the UK, US and Australia.

Multimap was the first company to put maps on the web in Great Britain, and its activity has contributed enormously to the staggering growth that the online mapping and location-based services market overall has seen over the last decade. Multimap continues to innovate with new business services, new features on www.multimap.com, and its internal business processes.

Richard Hall, Ernst & Young’s Leader of UK Entrepreneur Of The Year, comments, “Sean is a technology visionary who has changed the landscape of mapping and location-based services over the last decade. He developed his own business concept and showed real determination in growing a strong brand that has become a household name. He has built a strong team at all levels of the organization and demonstrated strong financial performance; all combine to make him worthy of this award.

Despite being the founder of a multi-million-pound enterprise, Sean doesn’t rest on his laurels. He encourages his team to continue to be internal entrepreneurs – to practice ‘intrapreneurship’. This focus on innovation is key to success of his company, Multimap, because Sean knows that each new product has its own limited lifecycle and therefore what’s needed is a rolling product portfolio,” he continued.

Sean Phelan, founder of Multimap, said, “It is an honor to receive this highly-coveted and widely-respected award. I have to emphasize that my success and that of Multimap is entirely due to my 100-plus colleagues who have made the company what it is today. Multimap has seen consistent growth, based on solid, scaleable foundations and consistent excellence of customer service, for more than a decade. And, thanks to the combination of innovation and good business sense that underpins all our activities, we remain on track to be a leader on the global stage. So, on behalf of all Multimappers across the globe, I am delighted to accept this award. Thank you!”

About Multimap

Multimap is one of the world’s leading providers of mapping and location-based services. The company delivers more online maps, point-to-point driving directions and geo-spatial ("where's my nearest?") searches to more companies than any other supplier in Europe. All services are offered on mobile, PDA, kiosk, and interactive TV platforms. We also offer a highly-functional API (Application Programming Interface).

The public website, www.multimap.com, provides a range of free, useful services to assist with everyday life. Key features include street-level maps of Europe, USA, Canada, New Zealand and Australia; road maps of the world; door-to-door travel directions; aerial photographs; links to location information; and services such as hotel, restaurant and entertainment booking. The public site attracts over 10 million unique users, registers more than 190 million page impressions every month, and is one of the top 10 most visited websites in the UK.

Multimap recently featured in The Sunday Times Virgin Atlantic Fast Track 100 league table of fastest-growing unquoted UK companies across all sectors. In 2006, Queen Elizabeth II awarded Multimap The Queen's Award for Enterprise in the innovation category, and Multimap was one of only three companies to feature in the Sunday Times Microsoft Tech Track 100 league of fastest-growing unquoted UK technology companies for the fourth year running. Also in 2006, the company featured in the Deloitte Technology Fast 50 for the UK and Ireland, and the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 for EMEA. Multimap also featured in the Deloitte Touche's Technology Fast 50 league for London and Southern England in 2005 and, in the same year, Red Herring named Multimap as one of the Top 100 private companies in Europe.

About the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year awards

Ernst & Young has been defining the world’s best business leaders through the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year (EOY) awards programme for over 20 years. The programme was founded by Ernst & Young in the US in 1986 and the awards now take place in more than 40 countries across the globe

UK National Entrepreneur Of The Year 2007 Tim Richards, Chief Executive Officer and founder of Vue Entertainment Holdings Ltd competed with the world’s best business leaders for the title of Ernst & Young World Entrepreneur Of The Year, at the sixth annual awards ceremony in Monte Carlo this month. The title was won by Guy Laliberté, founder of Canada’s Cirque du Soleil.

UK Entrepreneur Of The Year operates in four regions (Scotland, the North Region, the South Region, and London) and regional award winners progress to a national final. The national sponsor is the London Stock Exchange.

The awards are endorsed by the Department of Trade and Industry, the British Chamber of Commerce, the Design Council, the Institute of Directors, the Young Presidents' Organisation and the Community Action Network.

The EOY 2007 London judges panel is chaired by Oliver Hemsley, Chief Executive Officer, NUMIS Corporation plc.

For further information visit www.eoy.co.uk

The 2006 London judging panel included Richard Benton, Mouchel Parkman and Public Recruitment Group, Rosaleen Blair, Alexander Mann Solutions, Oliver Hemsley, NUMIS Corporation Plc, Barry Houlihan, Mobile Interactive Group, Horacio Luis Carvalho, HLC Climate Change Ventures Ltd, Roger McDowell, Intec Telecom Systems, and Keith Willey, London Business School.