Simon Woodroffe

About Simon Woodroffe

Simon Woodroffe OBE is a British entrepreneur best known for founding YO! Sushi in 1997 and YOTEL in 2006, and for being one of the original Dragons on the BBC’s Dragons’ Den. After leaving boarding school at 16 and serving time in prison at 19, he spent two decades in the music business, designing stages for major rock acts and working on Live Aid in 1985.

At 45, after business failures and divorce, he opened YO! Sushi with £200,000 and created one of Britain’s most iconic restaurant brands. He went on to build YOTEL into a global hotel chain with properties from Singapore to New York. Appointed OBE in 2006 for services to hospitality, Simon has spent the past two decades speaking internationally about entrepreneurship, innovation and reinvention. Simon’s latest book, YO! Man, is due to be published in June 2026.