Businesses
Jones set up a business in which he made personal computers with his own brand when he was 16 years old. However, he lost £200,000 after deciding to sell it to IBM. In an interview with The Times , Jones said his computer business failed in his twenties; he lost his four-bedroom home in Bray and his cars, and had to move back in with his parents. [9] He then joined Siemens Nixdorf, where he ran the U.K. arm of the computer division. [10]
In his mid-twenties, he opened a cocktail bar in Windsor based on the Tom Cruise film Cocktail .
After Siemens' acquisition, he set up his next venture, Phones International Group, in April 1998. [11]
In the summer of 2005, Jones, together with Theo Paphitis, a fellow panellist on Dragons' Den , bought gift experience company Red Letter Days from another panellist Rachel Elnaugh, under whose ownership it had collapsed. [12]
Jones founded other businesses between 1998 and 2007, including 10telecom which he later sold to Vodafone, Data Select, which became a market-leading distributor of mobile phones, Wines4Business.com, [13] an online retailer specialising in the sale of wine and champagne to corporate clients, and Celsius Resourcing, a recruitment business specialising in biotechnologists. [14]
In 2005, he founded The Peter Jones Foundation, a charity to support the advancement of education in young women, particularly through teachings of enterprise and entrepreneurship. [15]
In 2009, Jones founded the Peter Jones Enterprise Academy (PJEA, formerly NEA) to teach entrepreneurial capabilities within the UK. PJEA has several campuses including Amersham, Sheffield, Manchester, Southend and Oxford. In November 2013, it was reported that a new Peter Jones Enterprise Academy was to be opened in Leamington through Warwickshire College. Pupils were taught how to enhance a company or key skills for becoming a successful entrepreneur. The academy was to offer the BTEC Level 3 Enterprise and Entrepreneurship at both its Leamington and Rugby campuses. [16]
According to his website, some of his investments in businesses which appeared on Dragons' Den include luxury lifestyle and culture Wonderland magazine; Square Mile International, which provides data services for marinas and was later sold to BT; contemporary circus company The Generating Company; Synthetic Genomics; iTeddy; and Reggae Reggae Sauce. [17]
He owns a TV production company, Peter Jones TV, and has several property investments; his properties include several commercial offices, a Portuguese villa which he bought from DJ Chris Evans [9] and a property in Beverly Hills, California, as well as Barbados and Switzerland. [18]
Jones sold part of Phones International Group, Wireless Logic, for £38 million in 2011, [19] [20] [21] retaining the Data Select part. [20] [22]
In 2013, Jones became the main investor and owner of photographic retailer Jessops. [23]
In August 2017, it was reported that Jones and his Dragon's Den and Red Letter Days partner Theo Paphitis were almost scammed by an accountant who forged cheques over a two-month period. [24]
