| Website | shutl.co.uk |
| Blog | twitter.com/shutl |
| @tomall | |
| Birthdate | 1980 |
| Dartmouth College, BA- incomplete | 2002 |
| Sociology |
Tom Allason is a London based entrepreneur who is founder & CEO of Shutl. He was formerly founder & CEO of eCourier.co.uk.
Allason attended Eton College before reading sociology at Dartmouth College in USA.
He started his first ‘business’ in his teens making fake IDs for other students. His first technology venture attempted to put location based captive video advertising in NYC cabs (2002) but never made it off the ground.
In 2003, Tom founded eCourier.co.uk, the online courier business with the purple vans after a particularly painful experience with his local courier company. Tom saw an opportunity to transform a market whose business model had not changed in 20 years by improving quality of service, scalability and profitability. Tom teamed up with Jay Bregman and 2 other co-founders.
Tom left eCourier in ‘08 to set up Shutl. Shutl which came out of stealth mode at Le Web in Dec ‘09 is a web-service that connects retailers to local courier firms enabling the retailers to offer their customers 90min delivery of online & in-store purchases. Shutl also lets customers choose to receive their purchases within a one hour time-slot of the consumer’s choice 24/7.
In 2007, Tom was named “Top Gun†by Growing Business magazine and eCourier was named “London’s Most Inspirational Business†by the Evening Standard. Tom assists a number of early-stage start-ups. In 2008, eCourier was 53 on the Sunday Times Microsoft Tech Track 100. In 2009 eCourier reached 6 on Deloitte’s list of UK’s fastest growing technology businesses with 5291% growth since 2004.
Outside of business, Tom is a founding trustee of FoundationStone, a charitable trust that invests in startup charities, and in his spare time he is a keen poker player and skier.
Awards- • Finalist in The Next Web Startup Competition, 10 (Shutl) • Finalist in UK & Ireland TechTour, 10 (Shutl) • Co-winner (with Skimlinks) of Innovate! Pitch Slam London, 10 (Shutl) • Finalist in LeWeb startup competition, ‘09 (Shutl) • Top 25 European Startups, ETT Web & Mobility Finalist, ‘09 (Shutl) • 6th on Deloitte’s list of UK’s fastest growing tech businesses (5291% growth since 2004),’09 (eCourier) • 51st on Sunday Times Microsoft Tech Track 100, 2009 (eCourier) • Growing Business: Top Gun, 2007 (Tom Allason) • Evening Standard: London’s Most Inspirational Business, 2007 (eCourier) • British Computing Society: Business Achievement Flagship, 2006 (eCourier) • CNET Networks: Mobile Product or Initiative of the Year, 2006 (eCourier) • Effective IT Awards: Most Innovative Use of IT, 2006 (eCourier) • Effective IT Awards: Most Effective Use of Communications Technologies, 2006 (eCourier) • Effective IT Awards: Most Effective Use of IT in Mfg and Logistics, 2006 (eCourier) • Growing Business: Essence of the Entrepreneur, 2006 (eCourier) • National Customer Service Awards: eCommerce Award, 2005 (eCourier) • Department of Trade and Industry: Innovator’s Award for Transport, 2005 (eCourier) • Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport: Excellence in Information Management, 2005 (eCourier) • NatWest Startups Awards: Best Use of Technology, 2005 (eCourier) • British Computer Society: President’s Award for Mobile Computing, 2005 (eCourier) • O2 / Real Business, Top 50 to Watch in Mobile, 2005 (eCourier)
| Company | Date | Round | Size | Participants |
| Shutl | 8/10 | Angel | £400k | 5 |
| Shutl | 1/08 | Seed | £110k | 6 |
| eCourier.co.uk | 9/03 | Seed | £1M | 1 |
