Skip to content

Bio – Manoj Ranaweera

Last update: 2023-09-29

Short Bio

Manoj has been building tech startups and related ventures since 2004 with many failures and two Exits. Northern Tech Awards and edocr.com were acquired by GP Bullhound and Accusoft, Inc respectively. Manoj built Manchester’s Tech Startup Ecosystem from 2006 to 2013 by bringing investors and tech founders together through 100 tech events. Today, Manoj runs Techcelerate (trusted tech founder community), Deal Lite (intelligence on UK venture-backed tech companies and investors who back them) and SkilledUp Life (skilled volunteers for tech startups). 

Long Bio

Manoj founded his first tech startup, a FinTech in electronic invoicing and payments in 2004. He failed miserably and in the process figured out he did not know how to build a tech startup or knew others who were building tech startups in his adopted city, Manchester, UK.  He then founded Techcelerate which built Manchester’s tech startup ecosystem from 2006 to 2013, and Manoj used it to learn. In 2007 Manoj founded, edocr.com which was recognised in 2008 as one of the hottest 20 tech startups in the UK, which led to touring San Francisco, USA. In 2013, GP Bullhound acquired Northern Tech Awards from Manoj, the flagship event of Techcelerate. In 2015, edocr.com was acquired by US-based Accusoft. 

In 2018, Manoj restarted Techcelerate to reduce wastage in building and scaling tech startups. As part of this initiative, Manoj has built a trusted tech founder network helping tech founders in their journey from start to exit.

To further assist tech founders, Manoj launched Deal Lite (intelligence on UK venture-backed tech startups and investors who funded them) and SkilledUp Life (volunteer talent for tech startups).

Manoj’s Tech Entrepreneur Journey

(Not all are Limited Companies):

  1. 2004 to 2006: ebdex – electronic document exchange for connecting Accounts Payable (A/P) and Accounts Receivables (A/R) to facilitate faster payments with potential to extend to a fully-pledged Supply Chain Finance solution. [Secured £250k debt finance] 
  2. 2006 to 2012/13: Techcelerate – 2,300 strong tech ecosystem for tech entrepreneurs, investors and dealmakers [Got tired in 2012 and eventually closed down in 2013 after the disposal of (5)]
  3. 2007 to 2015: edocr.com – YouTube for documents. Best way to generate maximum ROI from publicly shareable documents for businesses [Acquired by Accusoft, Inc in March 2015]
  4. 2008: Foresight North – A research analyst firm co-founded with Dr. Angel Salazar. [Closed down due to lack of early traction]
  5. 2011 to 2013: Northern Tech Awards – UK’s first black-tie event dedicated to celebrating tech entrepreneurship in style [Acquired by GP Bullhound, a boutique investment bank in August 2013]
  6. 2011 to 2012: Tech Centre Manchester – A joint venture with Bruntwood, provided a co-working environment for tech startups in Manchester. [Closed at end of 2012 when the office floor was snatched by a Bruntwood customer]
  7. 2012: CRMPlus – the first thin universal address book, which syncs all your SaaS products. [Closed due to front-end delivery issues]
  8. 2015 to 2017: UnifiedVU – Redefining how we consume business software. [Failed to gain traction – often told ahead of the market].
  9. 2017 Jan to 2017 Nov: Venture 9 – Tech startup consultancy services [Folded into (11)].
  10. 2017 May to 2017 Aug – Unified Health – Spin out of (8) [Shut down due to poor chemistry of the team].
  11. 2018 August onwards: Techcelerate – help Tech Companies achieve growth through access to investment, know-how, talent and markets.  
  12. 2019 Apr onwards: Deal Lite – Crunchbase for the UK. Investment intelligence built on top of (8). Later added two Press Release sites.
  13. 2020 Apr to July: Furloughed Life: Connecting furloughed with tech startups. Donated everything made to NHS charities. 
  14. 2020 Aug onwards: SkilledUp Life taking the learnings from Furloughed Life.
  15. 2021 : Progress Hero – code base obtained from CrowdCube when they killed a product. Trying to restart with Andrew Threlfall. 
  16. 2022: Leaderboad. Built by a SkilledUp Lifers – not yet launched.
  17. 2022: SkilledUp Life Micro Fund: With Andrew Threlfall, but parked it for the time being.

From above, the following are active:

  • Techcelerate – trusted founder network
  • Deal Lite – intelligence on venture-backed UK tech startups and investors who back them
  • SkilledUp Life – Volunteer talent for tech startups, now with 40,000+ Volunteers from 130 countries

 

Life before

Prior to entering the tech startup world, Manoj successfully leveraged management and leadership skills in technology, engineering, transportation, utilities and oil and gas sectors for over 10 years working for two multinational consultancy firms, Parsons Brinckerhoff and Parsons International representing end clients, banks, bidding consortia and contractors during multi-stages of project life cycles, in the UK and Middle East.

Most enjoyable projects:

  • Winning the consortium bid to build and operate Croydon Tramlink – Manoj was responsible for the circa £10 m light current solutions from non-vital signalling, telemetry SCADA to public address systems.
  • Abu Dhabi Sewerage telemetry SCADA system – re-designed and went to tender in 3 months.

Manoj has an MBA from Manchester Business School and a B.Eng (Hons) from Brighton University (Polytechnic). His full profile can be accessed via LinkedIn

Exits

Manoj exited Northern Tech Awards to GP Bullhound, a boutique investment bank in 2013. Whilst they have changed the focus of the event, it continues to be the main tech celebration event in the North of England. 

Manoj exited edocr.com to Tampa, Florida, USA based Accusoft, Inc in 2015. Due to technical debt, Accusoft rebuilt the product. During the switchover, they lost a significant number of users and assets. edocr.com is much stronger than it was when Manoj exited, but the focus in terms of the target audience has changed. Manoj continues to be a regular user of the product with occasional email exchanges with Accusoft’s CEO.  There is a funny story of how the acquisition came about, but it’s not for writing down but only to be shared with a drink. 

As a person

Manoj is approachable – sometimes a bit arrogant (according to his lovely wife).

Manoj is on a 20-year business journey

When Manoj turned 50, he decided to focus the rest of his life on the business of building tech startups. He set a target of building 5 businesses over the next 20 years, with an overarching focus on reducing waste in building tech startups.

Five businesses focusing on:

Managing all 3 efforts let alone 5 has been a bit of a nightmare for Manoj. He believes the trick is to get (3) operationally sound and leverage it for the rest. By his own rules, the skilled volunteer talent of SkilledUp Life is not available to service companies. Sadly, this means Techcelerate cannot benefit from it unless Manoj breaches his own rule.

All of the above are bootstrapped.