Lopa Patel

Lopa Patel, MBE, is a British Indian businesswoman and a strategically minded leader in executive and non-executive roles. She is best known for delivering transformational change via the implementation of digital technology.

Early life and education
Her parents were shopkeepers who arrived in Britain from Kenya in the 1970s.

After graduating BTec in Computer Science (1983) and BSc from UMIST in 1986 Patel pursued a graduate traineeship at ICI.

Career
Patel's entrepreneurial career began when she took over a printing business which she developed into the database management and direct marketing company DMS Direct. She went on to found multi-award-winning Redhotcurry.com (a recipe-sharing site that developed into a South Asian lifestyle portal before becoming an ecommerce site). She is the Chair of Diversity UK, having founded and served as CEO from 2012 to 2019, the equality charity which researches and promotes diversity in Britain. In 2008 she was appointed to the board of Becta (British Educational Communications and Technology Agency). In 2014 she set up the online news and lifestyle publisher New Asian Post for which she developed the Asian Power Couples Hot 100 and Asians in Tech brands before exiting the business in December 2020.

Patel was one of eight media experts appointed to a panel to advise on a review of the BBC Charter in 2015.

In 2016 Patel was appointed as a Trustee of the Science Museum Group, serving on its Audi & Risk Committee and Digital Advisory Board. She was reappointed for a second term in 2021 by the Prime Minister going on to serve as the Chair of the National Science & Media Museum, Bradford. In the same year she also completed the FT Director Programme, Non-Executive Director's Diploma (Corporate Governance).

In 2018 Patel was appointed a Non-Executive Director of the Intellectual Property Office and re-appointed for a second term in 2021 to help deliver a digital transformation programme for the executive agency responsible for British patents, trademarks and designs.

Patel is acknowledged as a Chartered Institute of Marketing Fellow for her strong communications expertise and is regularly invited to participate in high level consultations at the interface of the public and private sectors. She was also appointed the first British Asian Fellow of the Institute for Data & Marketing.

Enterprise Promotion

Patel won an Asian Woman of the Year Award in 2005 for her work as a new media entrepreneur, an achievement showcased in a Department of Work and Pensions report to Parliament on equality of opportunity. In 2009 she was awarded an MBE for "services to the creative industries". In 2015 she became the first Asian woman to receive the Queen's Award for Enterprise Promotion.

Known for championing innovation, entrepreneurship and technology, Patel serves as a judge for the Great British Businesswoman Awards, Tech Nation's Applied AI Programme (from 2019 to 2022) and has also been a judge for the Queen's (now King's) Awards for Enterprise in Innovation category since 2017

Awards
In 2017 Patel was awarded an honorary doctorate by The Open University "for her exceptional contribution to diversity in the STEM sector".

In 2018 she was featured in the '100 Most Influential in UK India Relations' 2018 list by the India Inc group for her support of the UK-India Year of Culture 2017-2018 celebrated through the 'Illuminating India' exhibitions at the Science Museum in London supporting business links between the two countries. That year Patel was also featured in the Cranfield University '100 Women to Watch in 2018' list.

In 2019 Patel was features in the Green Park BAME 100 Business Leaders Index. In 2021 she won the TechWomen 100 2021 Champion of the Year Award, celebrating the occasion at a mass online event, and in 2022 she was shortlisted in the Digital Leader of the Year category of the Digital Leaders 100 Awards before being ranked at No#13 in Computer Weekly's Most Influential Women in UK Tech 2022. In 2023 she was featured in the inaugural list of the Top 100 Influential People who affect and impact society across a broad range of sectors, making the world a better place.