Job: UK digital champion
Age: 37
Industry: digital media
Staff: 8
2009 entry: 97
As the government's digital champion Martha Lane Fox's mission is nothing less ambitious than getting the entire country online by the end of 2012.
The co-founder of Lastminute.com and poster child for the internet generation, Lane Fox was appointed by Gordon Brown and had her role expanded by David Cameron to include advising the government on how to use the web more effectively.
Her government-backed Race Online 2012 initiative, which published its manifesto this week, aims to get the 10 million people in the UK who have never used the internet to join the digital revolution.
"Internet refuseniks won't have a choice but to get online if they are to access certain key services," said Lane Fox. "There are going to be huge cost cuts and digitalisation is an enormous piece in the puzzle. The world has changed. It's inevitable now."
Getting everyone online could save the government up to £1bn in customer costs every year and boost the economy by more than £20bn. But at a time of big government cutbacks, funding for the initiative is going to have to come from the private sector.
Lane Fox's taskforce has signed up partners including Google, BT, Microsoft and McDonalds.
"It's often the people facing the toughest times who have the most to gain from what technology has to offer," she said. "As the internet is rapidly becoming a tool for everyday life, we should work together to make sure everyone can benefit."
Lane Fox made £13m when Lastminute.com, which she founded with Brent Hoberman in 1998, was sold for £577m seven years later. Her digital champion role is an unpaid one.
She nearly died in a car crash in 2004 when her open-top Jeep skidded off a desert road in Morocco. The accident broke 28 bones and left her needing 23 operations. She said for a while it was "touch and go" and the accident helped her "see technology from a different perspective".
The daughter of historian Robin Lane Fox, she is also chair of the karaoke chain Lucky Voice and is a non-executive director of Channel 4, Marks & Spencer and Mydeco.com.
