Jason Drummond

Drummond was born on the 26th of June 1969 [2] [3] and raised in Fulham, London. He has a younger brother, Justin, and an older brother, Nigel, with whom he grew up in a single parent household. [4]

Whilst still attending school, Drummond sold mail-order computers and went on to establish IDL Communications Limited, a distributor of mobile phones and fax machines, shortly thereafter.[4]

Drummond spent three years outside of the UK, establishing and running distribution and new media companies in emerging markets such as Russia and Africa and returned to the United Kingdom in 1995.

In February 1992, when Drummond was 22 years old, Drummond became a director of business support services company European International Public Company Limited. [5] [6] [7] Drummond resigned as a director of the company in August 1994. European International Public Company Limited entered compulsory liquidation in May 1995. [6] [7] [8]

Also in February 1992 Drummond was appointed as a director of the wholesale company European Communications International Limited. [9] [10] Drummond remained a director to July 1996 at which time the company was dissolved via a voluntary strike-off of the Companies Register. [10] [8]

From November 1992 to January 1997 Drummond was a director of European Insurance Consultants Limited, a wholesale business. [11] [12] In January 1997 European Insurance Consultants Limited was dissolved via voluntary strike-off. [12] [8]

In August 1996 Drummond became a director of Virtual Internet Limited, later renamed as Virtual Internet (UK) Limited, [13] a directorship he held until January 1999. [13] Virtual Internet was founded as an online intellectual property protection and web hosting services business. Virtual Internet was admitted to the Alternative Investment Market (AIM), a sub-market of the London Stock Exchange, in January 1999 via a £15 million reverse takeover of AIM Plc cash shell Charriol Plc, changing the Charriol Plc name to Virtualinternet.net Plc, [14] with Virtual Internet Limited being the trading subsidiary of the listed Plc. [15] [14] [16] Drummond became a director of Virtualinternet.net Plc in January 1999. [17] In March 2000 Virtualinternet.net Plc combined a £27 million fundraising with a move to the official list [18] [19] and changed its name to Virtual Internet Plc the following month in April 2000. [14]

Following the float of Virtual Internet, Drummond became involved in a tax dispute with the United Kingdom tax authorities concerning taxable proceeds from the sale of some of his Virtual Internet shares. [20] [21] [22]

In March 1997 Drummond was appointed as a director of Parable Telecommunications Group Plc, formerly named Coms.Com Group Plc. [23] [24] Drummond continued to serve as a director until November 2001. In November 2001 Parable Telecommunications Group Plc entered into a creditors voluntary liquidation. [25] [26] [7]

In March 1999 Drummond was appointed a director of Parable Telecommunications Limited, formerly named Coms.Com Limited, continuing as a director until November 2001. [27] [28] Parable Telecommunications Limited entered into creditors voluntary liquidation in November 2001. [25] [26] [7]

By the age of 30, the Guardian described Drummond in March 2000 as "richer than all of the Spice Girls put together and virtually unknown".[29] The following year, in April 2001, the Telegraph included Drummond in its list of "The Net Losers." [30]

In 2000 Drummond founded Coms with the aim of using the internet to carry and deliver voice telephone calls, known as Voice over Internet Protocol VoIP. [31] [32] [33] Coms Plc listed on the AIM market in London with Drummond as Executive Chairman in September 2006 via the reverse takeover of Azman Plc, a cash shell company which had listed on AIM in March 2005. [26] [34] [33] [35] In October 2006 Coms launched its VoIP service to the UK public. [32] [31]

In March 2000, Drummond founded Xworks Limited, an e-business incubator, which was admitted to trading on AIM in April 2001 with a market cap of £4.4m at 10p a share. In August 2002, Xworks changed its name to Gaming Corporation to reflect its principal business "casino.co.uk". [36] In May 2003 Drummond was appointed Chairman of Gaming Corporation. [37] In March 2005, Gaming Corporation raised £10 million before expenses from institutional investors. [38] [39] In March 2005 Drummond sold 16,279,618 Gaming Corporation shares he owned in return for around £2.2 million in cash. [38] In May 2005 Gaming Corporation acquired Gambling.com for £10.5 million ($20 million USD). [40] [39] For the year ending September 2006, Gaming Corporation made profits of £2.5m. The US SAFE Port Act of October 2006 made online payments by US customers to online gaming companies illegal, causing a multi-million pound write-down in the value of Gambling.com, which was later disposed of within part of a combined sale of assets totaling £1.5 million. [41] [42] [43] [39] In October 2006, Gaming Corporation changed its name to Media Corporation. The company sold Casino.co.uk to CryptoLogic for £3.62m in cash in August 2007.[44] In March 2009 Media Corporation published recorded losses of over £11.2 million for its 2008 financial year. [45] In October 2009 Media Corporation acquired the online gambling business Purple Lounge. [46] [47]

In October 2000 Virtual Internet Plc became the first UK public company to gain ICANN accreditation. [48] In November 2000, Drummond founded RegistryPro,[49] a joint venture between Virtual Internet and Register.com which created the domain name .pro. In February 2002 Virtual Internet Plc was sold for £12 million to Register.com, with Drummond receiving approximately half of the sale price. [50] [51] In May 2002 Drummond was appointed as a director of Virtual Internet (UK) Limited for a second time [13] purchasing the entire web hosting division of Virtual Internet Plc from Register.com for £622,000 in cash [52] and making Virtual Internet's web hosting division a wholly private business within Virtual Internet (UK) Limited. [25] [13]

In May 2003 Norwegian web hosting provider ActiveISP bought the privately held Virtual Internet web hosting business by acquiring Virtual Internet (UK) Limited. [48] [25] In June 2004 Drummond resigned for a second time as a director of Virtual Internet (UK) Limited. [13] Drummond became a significant shareholder in ActiveISP (which was later renamed to Active 24 ASA), and the company listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange in October 2004 with a market cap of NOK 270m. ActiveISP was taken over by Mamut ASA and subsequently acquired by Visma in the summer of 2011 and delisted from the Oslo Exchange.[53][54] The Virtual Internet web hosting business, Virtual Internet (UK) Limited, was bought out by staff and management [48] and later acquired in January 2009 by the UK2 Group [55] [56] [57] a subsidiary of The Hut Group. [48] [58] [59]

In 2005 Drummond was a co-founder of Betex Technologies, which later became part of Betex Group Plc. Betex was a lottery management and technology company with its main operations in China.[60] Betex Group Plc later entered liquidation [61]

From September 2005 to October 2006 Drummond was a director of Metacharge Limited, [62] an Internet payment service provider that was later sold to PayPoint plc for £8.4m in October 2006. [63]

In 2005 Drummond co-founded FairFX with Ashley Levett, to be later joined by additional founders Stephen Heath and Ian Stafford-Taylor. [64] [65] [66] [7]

In November 2005 Drummond became a director of Shellworks Limited,[67] which was admitted to trading on AIM in December 2005 as Nettworx Plc having raised approximately £9.4 million after expenses. [68] Drummond took the role of joint Executive Director of Nettworx Plc alongside Jonathan Rowland. [68] In May 2009 Nettworx announced that its AIM listing was to be cancelled and the company wound-up by way of a members voluntary liquidation, with its remaining mainly cash assets being distributed to shareholders. [69] [7]

In January 2012 Media Corporation announced that revenues for its Purple Lounge online gambling business in 2011 had reached £27.5 million and that the business had attained 120,000 registered customers. [70] In February 2012 Drummond stepped down as Chairman of Media Corporation. [71] [37] In May 2012 Media Corporation announced the closure of its Purple Lounge division, with Media Corporation's directors giving the reasons for the closure as being due to historic operational and financial failings within the business. [72] [73] [74] All Media Corporation trading activities ceased in August 2013.[75][76] In May 2014 Media Corporation entered into a Corporate Voluntary Arrangement. [77]

In September 2012 Drummond stepped down as Executive Chairman of Coms Plc and subsequently reduced the number of shares he held in the company. [78] [79] [80]

In August 2013 Drummond was appointed Chairman of London Main Market listed company C.A. Sperati Plc. [81] Following Drummond's appointment Sperati moved to the AIM market segment of the London Stock Exchange [82] [83] and changed its company name to Teathers Financial Plc. [84] [85] The company raised in excess of £1 million in additional funds [86] [87] [88] [89] while selling its existing buttons business and its freehold factory property [83] [86] [84] and adopting an investing policy for the company under AIM rules. [84] In December 2015 Teathers Financial Plc shares were suspended on the AIM market as a result of the company not implementing its investment policy under AIM rules. [90] In May 2016 Teathers Financial Plc shareholders sought to requisition a General Meeting of the company at which it was proposed to remove the company's directors. [91] In June 2016 Drummond resigned as a director of Teathers Financial Plc [92] and the company's shares were cancelled from trading on the AIM market. [93] [94]

In November 2013 Drummond founded Nenx Limited, later renamed Gametech Limited in March 2015 and Gametech UK Limited in January 2016, a company whose activities were focussed on mobile phone gambling. [95] Between 2013 and 2016 Gametech UK Limited raised over £7 million from investors through the sale of shares and the issue of convertible loan notes. [96] [97] Gametech UK Limited was licensed and regulated in the UK by the UK Gambling Commission and sold mobile gambling products under the brand names 'NENX' and 'ProOptions'.[98]. Its subsidiary Gametech (Cyprus) Limited, previously named Nenx Limited, was similarly regulated throughout the remainder of Europe by CySEC. [99] In July 2014 Drummond was appointed as a director of Gametech UK Limited's subsidiary Dito Limited [100] where Drummond remained as a director until May 2019. [100] [101] Gametech (Cyprus) Limited was sold by Gametech UK Limited in March 2017 for £87,000. [102] Gametech UK Limited entered administration in April 2017, with the appointed administrators Begbies Traynor citing the decision came about as a result of operational difficulties. [103] [104] In September 2018 a Moratoria notice was published in the London Gazette regarding Drummond, Gametech UK Limited and the future carrying on of business using the names Gametech, Nenx, Pro Options and Dito. [105] In April 2019 Gametech UK Limited entered compulsory liquidation. [106]

In August 2014 FairFX Group Plc listed on the AIM Market of the London Stock Exchange with Drummond as Chairman. Approximately £2.6 million before expenses was raised via the flotation with Drummond holding 7.38% of FairFX Group Plc shares. [65] [64] [7] [107] In November 2014 Drummond stepped down as Chairman of FairFX Group Plc and resigned as a director of its subsidiaries FairFX Plc and FairFX (UK) Limited, while initially maintaining a 7.65% shareholding in FairFX Group Plc. [64] [108] [109] [66] [110] Between August 2015 and September 2015 Drummond sold 2,349,000 of his FairFX Group Plc share-holding, leaving Drummond with a 4.057% stake in September 2015. [111] [112] FairFX is a peer-to-peer foreign currency exchange with turnover of £1.1 billion (2017).[113] In 2017 FairFX raised £25m and acquired Q Money and its e-money licence.[114]

In October 2018 Drummond became a director of Hoot Foods Limited, [115] a company involved in the food industry. [116]

In November 2018 Drummond was appointed as a director of Eight Vodka Limited, [117] a company involved in the drinks industry. [118]

In June 2019 Drummond became the sole director of Dito UK Limited, [119] a wholly owned subsidiary of Dito, Inc. a Delaware, United States incorporated company. [120]

In August 2019, a private prosecution was brought against Drummond and his younger brother by a former shareholder of Media Corp [121] [122]. The case was later withdrawn by the prosecution and at a subsequent cost hearing, District Judge Dean found that the claimant had acted improperly by submitting forged evidence. [123]

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