Young entrepreneur Imran Hakim is best known as one of the most successful individuals to gain investment on BBC2’s Dragons’ Den with his innovative iTeddy product. However his business experience goes far beyond the realm of television. An optometrist by profession, he runs a successful group of independent practices in and around his home town of Manchester. Having run his own business since he was 16, he has extensive first-hand experience of a huge range of business sectors.

Imran controls a diverse business portfolio which includes a lens laboratory, spectacle frame distribution, optical retailing, management, recruitment and most recently a toy company with the development of iTeddy. His business experience ranges from restructuring existing loss-making businesses out of administration to become successful and profitable operations and successfully negotiating licensing arrangements with global brands including Reebok, Longines and Revlon in order to secure distribution rights within given territories.
In 2007, after securing investment on Dragons’ Den, Imran worked with businessmen Theo Paphitis and Peter Jones to launch the award-winning iTeDDy and associated licence platform, www.iteddy.com. Billed as the Teddy Bear brand for the 21st century. This year Imran has put together a distribution deal with Vivid Imaginations UK’s biggest toy company, and the product is now retailing in more than 40 countries world-wide, including every major UK toy retailer (including Tesco, Asda, Argos, Woolworths, Costco, Makro, John Lewis, Littlewoods, Harrods, Hamleys etc) with an extensive TV campaign planned for later in the year.

Imran has won several business awards including Best Newcomer to Vision Express 2005, the North West Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2006, and Fusion Entrepreneur of the Year 2007. His work growing the iTeddy brand has earned him awards for Design, Innovation and Technology 07, Toy Inventor of the Year 07 and World Toy Innovation 08.

In his spare time, Imran works to encourage entrepreneurship, through speaking engagements and mentoring young entrepreneurs. He has recently teamed up with fellow entrepreneur Ben Way to look at investing seed capital in start-up companies.