Martha Lane Fox co-founded Europe’s largest travel and leisure website lastminute.com with Brent Hoberman in 1998, they took it public in 2000 and sold it in 2005. Martha was appointed a crossbench peer in the House of Lords in March 2013. She is currently the UK’s Digital Champion and chair of Go On UK, a coalition of public and private sector partners that are helping millions more people and organisations online. Martha co- founded and chairs LuckyVoice, revolutionising the karaoke industry. She chairs MakieLab, Founders Forum for Good and the Government Digital Service Advisory Board. She is a Non-Executive Director at Marks & Spencer, MyDeco.com and the Women’s Prize for Fiction. In 2007 Martha founded her own charitable foundation Antigone.org.uk and also serves as a Patron of AbilityNet, Reprieve, Camfed and Just for Kids Law. In 2013 Martha was awarded a CBE.
Martha should spearhead a national programme to “multilingualise” UK’s e-commerce web-sites. We are the world’s leading e-commerce retailer (12% of total retail sales); the world flocks (physically) to UK’s retail shopping, yet most are unable/deterred to access it via e-commerce. The potential benefit to the UK’s economy is enormous. Google’s “Translate” can probably do most of the work automatically. The Government could incentivate by setting up attractive VAT.rules etc.
As the UK’s Digital Champion I thought you may be interested in mentioning the launch of Find Me Some Government Space. I left an @mention for you on Twitter too. The story has been picked up by the media so you may be aware already. Cabinet Office Minister launches Find Me Some Government Space http://www.cds.co.uk/About-Us/News/