He probably made more hard cash from the internet than anyone else in the UK. But it never turned his head. And today he reckons he's on the verge of the Next Big Thing...
Of all Britain’s big-league entrepreneurs, Peter Wilkinson is one of the most enigmatic.
As the creator of Freeserve and the founder of Sports Internet – which he sold, in a breathtaking deal, to BSkyB for £301m in May 2000 – he has some mega-achievements on his CV. With an estimated wealth of £205m, he probably banked more cash than any Brit from the technology boom. And with shoulder-length locks, bags of strong opinions and a frank, self-deprecating manner, he ought to be a high-roller with a season ticket to Downing Street. In reality, though, he’s a publicity-shy, proud Yorkshireman with four kids who can’t stand London and admits to be being a hopeless networker. As he likes to put it: “I’m no Billy Big Bo***cks.â€
But gain access to the Peter Wilkinson inner circle, and you will find a 49-year-old keen to make one or two things clear. First things first: Freeserve. Is he really the creator of the dot-com phenomenon that was the biggest home-grown European internet company in 1999?
Absolutely. No question about it. “The concept of providing internet connectivity for the public at the cost of a local call rate was definitively my idea, my concept,†he says. And to prove it, he grabs a framed letter from the window-sill of his airy Harrogate office. It’s from John Plutheroe, then corporate development director at Dixons, and the public face of Freeserve. Dated September 23, 1998, just after the company was launched (Freeserve later floated in July 1999 valued at £1.5bn), the letter reads: “You changed the industry. You, Peter, you. I know that you are not a man for the limelight (and I don’t blame you) but I want you know that the people that matter will always remember it as your idea, your vision.â€
“Millions of people claim the credit for it,†smiles Wilkinson. “But I’m not that bothered. It made me a few quid.â€
Exactly how many quid is not clear. The details of the Freeserve royalty deal remain private, but Wilkinson does say: “I earned considerably more out of it than I did out of Planet.†Given that he received £27.6m on the 1998 sale of internet service provider Planet Online to Energis, it must have been a hefty sum.
Planet Online was the first big venture for this builder’s son from Leeds. At school (“you may not believe it, but I am a public school boyâ€), he was reckoned to be Britain’s fastest young bowler and almost became a professional cricketer. Instead, he got waylaid by “women and drinkingâ€, scraped a single A-level and, after a lucrative stint selling chips (the fried sort) at school, opted for a career in computer programming.
The next few years are a blizzard of capital letters. Built STORM and VDATA. Floated on AIM. SSS business with a new generation of MDS, which comprises VBAK. Basically, Wilkinson spent 20 years from 1983 building the £158m-turnover quoted data storage group that’s now called InTechnology. It’s still, he says, “the business closest to my heart.†And, while it’s not exactly booming, it is outperforming the sector and is on the hunt for acquisitions. As Wilkinson says more than once, “it is awful out there, but it’s a great time also. There’s some bloody cheap stuff [companies] out there. Aren’t you supposed to sell at the top and buy at the bottom?â€
Wilkinson is not your regular public-company boss. Discussing InTechnology’s plans to build a £500m business on the back of overseas expansion, he confronts the closure of its German office. “I’ll take the blame, we made a right Horlicks of it,†he says. “We had no reputation in Germany, no track record. We should have built by acquisition, not organically.â€
Wilkinson’s latest interest is DITG, a new business that’s developing interactivity for TV channels, where he is executive chairman. DITG has already launched Avago, the digital interactive bingo channel that, says Wilkinson, is drawing daily revenues of £30,000. Its “Spin to Win†game is making even more; dice and slots games are forthcoming.
“Interactive television is everything the internet wanted to be,†he says. “It’s already in seven million households. It’s fast, everyone can find your channel, and you don’t need to advertise.â€
DITG has brought together studios from the defunct Money Channel and technology from an Exeter-based business called Digital Impact. Now, says Wilkinson, it’s in serious discussions with some of retail’s biggest names, which are drawn to the idea of launching their own interactive TV channels for as little as £1m. “We’re fri**ing inundated down there in Wapping,†he enthuses. “It is the future.†No wonder he’s put £6m of his own money into the venture.
But he may struggle to woo Sky, a big player in the emerging interactive market, to do business with him. Wilkinson’s sale of Sports Internet to Sky in May 2000 for £301m is now seen as the ultimate boom deal. Sports Internet was a new business that had announced six-month turnover figures of, wait for it, £240,000. The top dogs at Sky are said still to fume at paying such a price.
Wilkinson is unapologetic. “When Sky did that deal, their share price was £20. Now it’s £6. They paid over-hyped money, but we got over-hyped shares.†[According to Wilkinson, the sale of Sports Internet netted him £127m in BskyB shares. Of the 8.6 million shares he received, he “hedged†75 per cent and retains the balance.]
“It did look like a tasty deal two years on,†says Wilkinson. “But there were bigger offers for Sports. I don’t feel any guilt. I didn’t foist the deal on them. Goldman Sachs [the brokers for Sky] felt the valuation was fair and reasonable.â€
That “reasonable†price has helped Wilkinson to fund involvement in other ventures. One is his stake in the Hull-based retail chain, The Gadget Shop. In 2002, Wilkinson bought 90 per cent of the 50-store chain and has now handed over the operational reins to Tom Hunter (of high-street chain Sports Division fame) and Chris Gorman, another top Scottish retail entrepreneur. The Gadget Shop is now, says Wilkinson, “going like a bomb†and, he says, plans to open another 50 stores across the UK.
Wilkinson’s other entrepreneurial interests remain, for the moment, private. One of them, however, begs the question of whether he’d be in the market for the troubled football club, Leeds United. He is adamant: “I am never, ever buying Leeds United.â€
Peter Wilkinson is determined to stay true to his roots. “I’m driven by a fear of failure,†he says. “My father ended his life with almost nothing. That fear still drives me on.†He smokes rolled-up cigarettes, insists that he wears no jewellery and, let’s be honest, looks a bit of a scruff. He used to drive Ferraris, but hasn’t had one for 18 months. He treasures his privacy so that his kids can grow up normally.
You sense that remaining normal is one of Wilkinson’s biggest personal challenges. He is wealthy beyond his wildest dreams. He lives among people and in an area that he can truly call home. He can afford to keep his entrepreneurial spirit ticking over by investing in new ventures. But he seems determined not to let it all go to his head.
“I worry about the lack of respect in this country and the amount of people who aren’t prepared to put in all the effort to make it [success] happen. You have to make the best out of what you’ve got. Life is tough. Business is tough. My fear is that this country is just turning into a bunch of whingers.â€
Selling at the top, buying at the bottom... people deserving respect... working hard... making the most out of what you’ve got... Maybe the Peter Wilkinson enigma is solved. He’s just an ordinary bloke who’s done some very extraordinary things.
