Oliver Cookson

Oliver Cookson (41) is a UK entrepreneur who established the sports nutrition business MYPROTEIN®.

Growing up in Manchester, Oliver left school aged 16 with one GCSE. Two decades later, he has been named the UK’s number one self-made millionaire under 40 with a net worth of £306m (Sunday Times Rich List 2019).

After leaving school, Oliver began, and swiftly departed, roles as a paperboy and in takeaway restaurants, before starting a modern apprenticeship in IT. He then quickly progressed to become a self-taught contract website developer or major global organisations.

In 2004, and growing tired of the day-to-day, Oliver decided to capitalise on his love of fitness and nutrition and used a £500 overdraft to launch a sports supplement idea, which would lay the foundations for a multi-million-pound company.

As the driving force behind its inspirational and well documented growth, the bootstrapped MYPROTEIN went onto to become the number one sports nutrition brand in Europe, employing over 100 people in Manchester with financials of over £5m EBITDA.