POLITICIAN's son Cally Russell was set on a career in public affairs until he had an epiphany on a train from the Highlands.

Mr Russell was working for Weber Shandwick in 2011 when reading the book "Anyone can Do It" by famed entrepreneur Duncan Bannatyne made him think again.

"I read it on the way back from Inverness on the train to Edinburgh and I read the whole thing. And after that I thought, you know what: I'm going to come up with something, I'm going to start my own thing," he recalls.

A week after the train ride Mr Russell, who goes by a nickname acquired while at Dundee University, handed in his notice and set off on a journey that led to him launching an online student magazine. This pulled in enough revenue to become a nice lifestyle business in his words.

Three years later the aspiring entrepreneur made the personal acquaintance of the influential Mr Bannatyne in a very public space.

Mr Russell appeared on TV's Dragons Den in February trying to raise funds from Mr Bannatyne and his fellow business angels for Mallzee, the personal shopping app venture he launched in 2013. The app allows people to highlight fashions they like on their mobile phones with a swipe of the finger and get details of offers from retailers.

"I was a bag of nerves at the start, spent three minutes shaking but after that I loved it," says the 27-year-old.

"They were all very complimentary, very nice."

In the event Mr Bannatyne decided not to back Mallzee saying it didn't operate in his area of expertise.

Another Dragon, Peter Jones, was impressed enough to be ready to invest £75,000 for a 20 per cent stake in the firm, only to find Mr Russell snubbed the offer on the grounds it undervalued Mallzee.

Three months after the show was broadcast, the young tyro has reasons to believe his confidence was justified.

He has cut a deal with Samsung under which Mallzee is available on the electronics giant's Samsung GALAXY Apps store. The business is being courted by investors ahead of a fund-raising that could put a multi-million pound valuation on Mallzee.

The company has signed up hundreds of thousands of users, many since Dragons Den. Some 120 retailers are on the ranging from site from Adidas to Zara. It launched successfully in the US last year.

The success shows what can be done in the digital age by entrepreneurial types; in Mr Russell's case helped by a mixture of insight, chutzpah and luck.

Mr Russell had the idea for Mallzee after tiring of shopping for clothes on busy high streets and seemingly clunky web sites.

He tested the appeal of an app that could allow people to find clothes they liked and link them with retailers by advertising the planned development of the service on a single page website. This generated huge interest.

"We signed up 3,000 people and spent £8. In 24 hours we signed up 700 people in Iceland where some blogger had written about it."

With clear evidence of demand for the service, Mallzee set about developing the software needed to help shoppers select clothes from the offerings of retailers.

The Edinburgh-based company launched the service on the web in May 2013 but decided two months later that the future lay in the mobile space.

"That was where the growth was occurring. Retailers were much more engaged in working with you in mobile as they were focused on the web."

With the business "hitting serious numbers every week" in his words, Mr Russell has reasons to be optimistic. He says the company only recently started focusing on how to maximise the revenues it can generate. The business began by charging retailers a commission on sales made through Mallzee then introduced fees for listing on the app.

But Mr Russell admits he has enjoyed his share of luck. He only decided to try a fashion app after another venture failed to achieve the success he hoped.

The "Recommended By" site was intended to highlight a much broader range of services than fashion but Mr Russell hit big problems with the development process.

The politics and history graduate says was he was fortunate that the setback happened when he was among the first cohort of hopefuls in the Entrepreneurial Spark hatchery backed by Sir Tom Hunter.

Mr Russell moved on to what became Mallzee after being encouraged to try again by mentors at ESpark

He speaks very positively of the time spent in the Glasgow hatchery and the benefits of getting mentoring from seasoned entrepreneurs there.

While in ESpark Mr Russell met Andrew Barrie who made millions from the sale of Barrie Hibbert, the Edinburgh-based risk management business, and who became an early backer of Mallzee.

Gareth Williams, of the Edinburgh-based Skyscanner flight search business, helped the young firm raise £500,000 from Scottish investors last year.

The ESPark experience involved character-building hardships like catching the 7.26am train from Edinburgh to Glasgow then walking to its Gorbals base to save money.

But Mr Russell seemed marked out for business success from an early age, even if politics may have been a more obvious career choice.

With his father Mike working as chief executive of the SNP and an MSP, he came across many people in his youth who have become stars of politics.

"I spent lots of my time in the SNP offices. Everyone who is now so prominent I grew up with as a child."

Russell junior also found time to run a successful Disk Jockeying business while still at Dunoon Grammar. He was in a team of pupils who sold coasters featuring local beauty spots, that came second in a national Young Enterprise Scotland competition

Now part of a new wave of young entrepreneurs in Scotland, Mr Russell's success shows what can be done in Scotland.

He says he hopes that Mallzee will match the achievements of other Scottish internet ventures that have had a big international impact such as Skyscanner and the Fanduel fantasy sports business.

Mr Russell believes the growth of such firms has played an important part in the development of a supportive environment for start ups in Edinburgh, where a range of incubator type spaces have sprung up in recent years such as the Codebase technology centre. ESpark has an Edinburgh base.

Mr Russell is doing his bit to help. Along with the Appointedd online bookings service developed by ESpark graduate Leah Hutcheon, Mallzee has created a space in Edinburgh called Silicon Walk where young businesses can work alongside the two firms.

Not one to be easily satisfied, the enterprising football fan's ambitions also include shaking up the global retail ecosystem.

"We have a great team building some really exciting stuff that will totally change the way people shop. We're working on things that will change the business for retailers."