DAVID Moulsdale, the taxi- driver's son who has built the fifth-largest optical retailer in the UK before his 30th birthday, was last night named Scotland's Entrepreneur of the Year.
The Optical Express founder was presented with Scotland's most coveted business prize by former winner Tom Hunter at the annual gala dinner at the Hilton Hotel in Glasgow of the Entrepreneurial Exchange.
The exchange stages the annual awards in association with PricewaterhouseCoopers and The Herald.
Moulsdale was narrowly pipped in last year's awards by travel entrepreneur John Boyle, a member of the judging panel. The panel also included John Anderson, director of the Entrepreneurial Exchange; Peter Cummings, regional director of Bank of Scotland; Linda Eadie head of corporate finance at Pricewaterhouse-
Coopers; Rita Rusk of Rita Rusk International, and Alf Young, Deputy Editor of The Herald.
Moulsdale, who founded the Optical Express chain with a shop in Leith eight years ago, earlier this year carried off the Scottish Business Achievement Award.
His group now has 104 stores after taking over a quoted English rival three times its size last year and eliminating its heavy losses. Moulsdale owns 100% of the company, believes he can grow the business quickly to 250 stores and a #150m turnover with profits of #15m to #20m, and has ''no plans to sell out''.
He becomes the award's third winner after Tom Hunter and John Boyle. He beat shortlisted finalists Jim Milne, the creator of Aberdeen-based Balmoral Group, and Donald Macdonald founder of Macdonald Hotels.
The Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year award was won by Kevin Dorren, who created Orbital Technologies in 1995 to develop and market Java-based ''knowledge management'' products for top US companies. Dorren is based in California with his engineering team in Edinburgh and is poised to announce a second-round funding from a mix of UK and US investors.
Dorren has ambitions for a public float on Nasdaq or Easdaq and said after flying back: ''I don't envy companies in the US trying to recruit and keep bright people. We have got a great pool of very smart people in Scotland.''
He beat finalists Lennie Moffat of call centre group TSC and John Scott of Scott Timber.
The award for Entrepreneurial Supporter of the Year went to Susan Laing, director of the Centre for Entrepreneurship at Napier Business School.
Set up three years ago, it has enthused more than 1000 students with the entrepreneurial mission, on a course which bridges the gap between academia and the business world. Laing was the driving force behind setting up the centre, which deploys a team of 30 business people in a supporting role.
She was chosen ahead of Juliette Chapman of Archangel Informal Investment and Ian McDonald, director of Connect.
The Exchange also stages the Scottish Student Business Plan Awards, for business start-up plans hatched on courses at universities and colleges. The undergraduate winners were Pamela Houston, Leigh Allen and Deborah Keaney from Glasgow Caledonian University for ''Weans World'', and the postgraduate winner was David Graham of Stirling University for ''Graham & Gunn''.
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