The week in founders, 17 October 2026
This week
Shein's UK sales reached £2.58bn, a 26 per cent rise, according to accounts filed at Companies House. That puts it past Asos. The £135 duty exemption its model depends on is due to go by October 2028.
The Trump administration has barred Microsoft and several other tech employers from using the H-1B skilled-worker visa as a fraud claim widens. Microsoft says 80% of its applications last year were for people already in the United States.
A City lobby group chaired by the London Stock Exchange's chief executive has asked John Healey for £1.28bn of listing tax breaks. It wants three tax changes in the 28 October Budget, and says Britain is losing its best companies at the point they matter most.
Wiremind, a Paris software firm, has raised €35m after turning down the venture route from 2014 until this month. Its founders keep majority control and say they are raising now because transport operators are buying AI quickly.
The lead
Estate agent builds listing-first social tool, tests two platforms
Libby Mays says MLSocial takes a property listing through to a published Facebook or Instagram post. Those two platforms are the only ones tested end to end so far.
Startup news
Three parents, £7,000 and 6,500 places: inside Kidora
A Flintshire mum built a children's resale marketplace after more than 50 failed Marketplace handovers. It now has two more parts, and still no outside money.
Salesforce architect quits, builds 100-person consultancy in Gurugram
Lalit Arora left an enterprise career in 2020 to sell technology services from Gurugram to buyers he had never met. Melonleaf Consulting now says it employs more than 100 people and has served more than 150 clients.
Blanq says it has worked with over 300 businesses
Radhika Agarwal built her consultancy on the premise that companies buy marketing before they have a brand. Her one hard number rests on records she has not published.
Direct Line founder moves tax residence to Florida, sees "no meaningful benefit"
Sir Peter Wood says the switch does not cut his tax bill. He is putting £5m into an eighth insurance venture, with a claims office planned for Manchester.
Inspiring stories
Denver café keeps drip at $3.50 while launching tenth city menu
Hot Shot Coffee opens its Hokkaido menu on 18 October, inside a York Street dry cleaner that stood empty for 14 years.
Wiremind takes €35m after 12 years without outside capital
The Paris software firm turned down the venture route from 2014 until this month. Its founders keep majority control and say the reason to raise now is how fast transport operators are buying AI.
Tips & tricks
Vercel's inbound agent now runs on 14 rules, not 1,000 lines
Vercel's COO has described how one engineer at 20% time, a prompt written by the best SDR and six weeks of human checking produced an agent that handles the top of the funnel. The lesson is what came after: most of the prompt turned out to be code.
Six founders kept the four-day week: what they changed
Cutting a day does not cut the work. The operators who stuck with it rewrote their meetings, their sign-off rules and their cover rotas first.
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