London Stock Exchange welcomes Diversity UK
The London Stock Exchange Group welcomed Diversity UK on Monday 11th June 2018 to mark its contribution to improving equality and inclusion in Britain. The date coincided with the launch of London Tech Week 2018 and the 171st birthday of women’s rights campaigner, Millicent Fawcett. Diversity UK members and guests were welcomed by Nikhil Rathi, CEO of the London Stock Exchange Group and senior colleagues from the organisation’s diversity and inclusion team. Lord Gadhia, who was a judge for Diversity UK’s Top 100 Asian Stars in UK Tech 2018 list, gave the keynote address emphasising the importance of diversity and inclusion for Britain.
“If a small minority of innovative companies hold the key to job creation and prosperity, policy makers can intervene to ensure highly effective strategies,” Lord Gadhia said, “we should certainly celebrate Britain’s vibrant startup ecosystem. London is the startup capital of Europe; we create 11,000 businesses a week and have attracted £5bn in venture capital funding in recent years which is more than Berlin, Paris and Stockholm combined. But it’s clear that we most focus on company growth as well as company formation. The UK’s international trade in digital services has been growing at over 20% and is worth £39bn”.
Top 100 Asian Stars in UK Tech
In 2014, Diversity UK launched the Top 100 Asian Stars in UK Tech list in association with KPMG, the Ethnic Minority Foundation and NewAsianPost.com. The annual list has become a platform to showcase Asian entrepreneurs and forms a springboard for many startups onto the next phase of their growth journey. In 2016, the organisation participated in a Diversity Tech Summit and in 2017, HRH The Duke of York presented the Chairman’s Award. The Duke formed the Pitch at Palace competition to help tech businesses scale-up globally and Diversity UK encourages startups from its list to enter the competition. In 2018, Diversity UK highlighted its support for the Queen’s Awards for Enterprise in the Innovation category.
Founder & CEO, Lopa Patel MBE said “Diversity UK continues to champion the tech sector and women’s entrepreneurship by forming an ecosystem to highlight excellence in creativity and innovation in science, technology and business. The Top 100 Asian Stars in UK Tech list continues to have an above average 28% representation of leading women across all categories. Our tech showcases, panel debates and speaker events reach out to BAME communities throughout Britain and internationally and reach younger audiences too.”
About Diversity UK
Diversity UK is a think tank to research, advocate and promote ideas for improving diversity and inclusion in Britain. It seeks to influence social policy, enhance civic engagement and improve the perception of the minority ethnic community in Britain by undertaking research, facilitating debates, hosting roundtable meetings and producing discussion papers.
It is a not-for-profit organisation run by Dilip Joshi MBE, Chair; Rita Hunt, Trustee and Lopa Patel MBE, Founder & CEO, and reaches more than 1500 senior UK BAME professionals. Diversity UK has a wide diversity outlook encompassing gender, race, age, sexual orientation, disability and class and it continues to scrutinise public appointments, workplace diversity, age discrimination and race relations in the UK.
About the Paul Stephenson Lecture
In addition to other initiatives, Diversity UK also marks race relations with the annual Paul Stephenson Lecture held in November each year. Dr Paul Stephenson OBE, the Bristol based British civil rights campaigner whose work led to the the Race Relations Act of 1965, accepted a lifetime achievement award at the inaugural lecture.
Dilip Joshi MBE, Chair of Diversity UK said, “In the world that we live in, the Paul Stephenson lecture represents a civil discourse that is necessary to ensure that we remember those who have made a difference to society in the past and showcase those who will make a difference in the future. Diversity UK is an organisation that operates at the confluence of community and business and we are grateful to the London Stock Exchange Group for marking the unique contribution it makes to Britain.”
