LBS has been ranked a top 10 business school for MBA founders worldwide by PitchBook in its 2025 list. Of more than 173,000 VC-backed founders analysed by PitchBook this year, 478 studied at London Business School, raising a combined $11.6 billion.
In addition, LBS placed ninth for business schools for female MBA founders in PitchBook’s 2025 list with 82 female MBA founders in 2025.
“Sometimes early-stage founders come to LBS to strengthen their knowledge, grow their networks and get mentorship on how to grow their startups, but most often people come to LBS with other ideas of their future life and then are bitten by the entrepreneurship bug while here,” says Jane Kedair, Executive Director of LBS’s Institute of Entrepreneurship and Private Capital (IEPC).
“We are thrilled to be ranked in the top 10 for female founders. The statistics around the gender chasm in VC-backed startups are well known, and as a business school, we make every effort to level the playing field.”
Alongside its impressive alumni, LBS backs its entrepreneurial ambitions through its £2 million Entrepreneurship Experience — a comprehensive programme offering expert mentorship, bespoke workshops, early-stage funding links and immersive startup support so that its founders don’t just launch, but scale successfully.
To celebrate the achievement of LBS securing a top 10 spot in the highly coveted PitchBook MBA founder list, we profile three LBS alumni entrepreneur success stories.
Aiden Corbett, co-founder and CEO, Wayflyer (MBA2013)
Wayflyer helps ecommerce merchants grow their business by providing financing and marketing analytics solutions that help them access working capital, improve cash flow and drive sales. Dublin-based Wayflyer became a tech unicorn in 2022 after a $150 million Series B fundraising round led by DST Global and QED Investors, with Guillaume Pousaz also participating. It is also backed by Credit Suisse and JP Morgan.
To date, the company has deployed more than $5 billion to more than 5,000 businesses and operates in 11 countries.
How did it all begin? Aiden studied studied Electrical Engineering at University College Cork, then went to work in the civil service, then McKinsey as a consultant but in his words, “that didn’t scratch the itch”.
“It wasn’t until I moved to London for an MBA in 2011 that the entrepreneurial spark was finally ignited.”
His first company, Kubicle, was bootstrapped from his bedroom, providing data analytics and digital literacy to corporates. One day, his business partner came to him with a brilliant idea. Why didn’t they use the technology they had developed to underwrite short-term finance for ecommerce merchants struggling with working capital?
As Statista projects ecommerce sales to exceed $4.3 trillion this year, it would be fair to say that Wayflyer was a smart bet on the future of retail.
Read more about his entrepreneurial journey.
Nuno Sebastião, co- founder, chairman and CEO of Feedzai (MBA2009)
Built on his work at the European Space Agency (ESA), Nuno, an engineer by training, co-founded Feedzai, a Portuguese-US data science company on a mission to fight financial fraud and money laundering using advanced machine learning and AI technologies.
Fourteen years after its launch, the fintech protects more than $70 billion in annualised payment volume and in October 2025 was named the European Central Bank’s partner to provide the central fraud detection and prevention mechanism for the forthcoming digital euro.
On the same day as the ECB announcement, Feedzai announced it was worth $2 billion after it closed its latest funding round. The new funding adds new institutional investors Lince Capital, Iberis Capital, and Explorer Investments, with renewed backing from Oxy Capital and Buenavista Equity Partners.
Feedzai’s platform has expanded to cover distinct financial institution product lines, including bank account openings, credit card transactions and transaction monitoring.
“Feedzai’s ability to execute across multiple product lines while scaling globally places them in the elite tier of software companies,” said Vasco Pereira Coutinho, CEO at Lince Capital. “Financial fraud is one of the defining risks of our time, and Feedzai combines proven technology with deep expertise to protect both banks and their customers. With its AI-driven, end-to-end approach to risk operations, Feedzai is uniquely positioned to transform the industry.”
Read more about his entrepreneurial journey.
Nina Briance, founder and CEO, Cult Mia (MBA2019)
Former Goldman Sachs and UBS investment banker, Cult Mia was this year named one of the fastest growing UK and Ireland startups by Sifted, a leading media brand and intelligence provider for the European startup and venture capital ecosystem – and co-founder Nina Briance (LBS MBA2019) was recognised by Vogue Business in its 2025 100 Innovators: Entrepreneurs and Founders.
Forbes has described Cult Mia as “the new face of luxury”. So, what is it and what did LBS have to do with it?
Cult Mia is an online fashion marketplace which directly connects customers with a curated selection of independent luxury brands from around the world, with a focus on sustainability and ethical values. In October 2024, H&M Group Ventures joined investors Morgan Stanley, Fuel Ventures and David Wertheimer from the Chanel family in buying into Cult Mia’s dynamic growth story, a commitment off the back of topline sales up 191% year-on-year.
Nina has said that the concept for Cult Mia came together during the LBS Launchpad pre-accelerator programme, which consists of workshops and mentorship, at the end of which participants pitch their business to a selection of judges for prizes. Nina was selected for this much-sought after programme in 2018 and in 2019, Cult Mia secured her the prize, which she has credited in giving her the confidence to pursue the business further. Nina then joined the LBS Incubator to further progress with her business.
Recently, Vogue Business recognised Nina among ‘Top 100 Entrepreneurial Innovators’.