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Jonathan Kruger’s plans to use technology to “reinvent” the fashion industry have been drawing attention from investors and journalists alike.

His company, The Drop, started trading only in April this year, but has already secured £250,000 in ‘pre-seed’ funding from venture capitalists Forward Partners and has also featured in the business pages of The Times. Jonathan (OE 2000–2007) expects to secure further investment of around £1.5m soon.

“We launched with a simple website and now we are using the investment we have already received to make it better and better, adding new features as often as twice a week. Next year, with the additional investment, we plan to expand into the US.”

Already, the website allows men to submit their measurements with a photograph and browse a range of styles before ordering made-to-measure suits from £299. They can then have them delivered anywhere in the world in two weeks. The suits are laser-cut and then hand-finished.

But, says Jonathan, that is just the start: “It’s not really a suit business. We are changing the way that clothing is made, discovered and bought and addressing each stage of the process. We looked at what is wrong with the fashion industry and we want to reinvent it, to disrupt the high street and the traditional retail structures.”

The inspiration came from a couple of years he spent working in Shanghai, where he set up a clothing company supplying big retailers. He told The Times journalist of his dismay at the wastage of natural resources and the damage done to human lives by the way the supply chain worked. Retailers would typically order a range six to 12 months in advance, with the clothing produced in very large quantities but in a limited range of styles and in limited sizing.

“We would be manufacturing dresses for $7, selling them for $11 and then they’d turn up in the shops at a few hundred quid. We saw lots of big retailers buying 20,000 of something and then deciding they don’t want it after it’s been produced. As consumers, we pay for this waste with our wallets.”

The Drop commissions a number of high-tech factories in the Far East to make its clothing. “It’s mass personalisation to replace mass production and fast fashion,” said Jonathan. “We only produce what we need, so we are building a fashion business that is not only better for the customer, but better for the world.”

Jonathan, who is The Drop’s chief executive officer, met his co-founder, Stephen Stroud, one-and-a-half years ago. Stephen is a software engineer and is The Drop’s chief technology officer. “We are building a platform which is AI-led: it uses machine learning to understand what you like to wear and how you like things to fit,” says Jonathan. The workforce at The Drop is being expanded as the business grows. “We should be a team of seven in the next couple of months.”

Jonathan took a degree in Politics at Sheffield after leaving QE, graduating in 2010. During his spell in Shanghai from 2010 to 2012, he helped establish and then manage a Chinese sales team for a UK-based trading company.

In the run-up to the end of the autumn term, Jonathan came as a speaker to QE’s Young Entrepreneurs Club in the Main Hall. Headmaster Neil Enright said: “We really enjoyed his excellent presentation and eight key messages for aspiring entrepreneurs.” These were:

1. 1. Don’t play it safe and don’t be afraid to fail;
   2. Always hustle:
   3. Think big and go big;
   4. Success takes time;
   5. Be stubborn on vision but flexible on details;
   6. Don’t let vanity make you lose focus;
   7. When starting out, no job is beneath you;
   8. Be humble enough to ask for help.

Two sixth-formers have achieved success in the English Speaking Union’s prestigious Mace debating competition and now go through to the next round.

Akshat Sharma and Mipham Samten, both of Year 12, were chosen to represent the Elizabethan Union – QE’s senior debating society – for the first round of the Mace at Kingsbury High School, where they competed against leading schools such as Haberdashers’ Aske’s Boys’.

They won their places in the next round with their successful arguments in favour of the proposition, This house would add e-sports to the Olympic Games, in one of the four debates held during the evening.

Academic Enrichment Tutor and Geography teacher Helen Davies said Akshat got things off to a strong start with an “inspirational introduction”, which highlighted the 43 million online viewers who recently watched an e-sports tournament taking place in the US. In fact, Akshat pre-empted many of the opposition’s points before the first opposition speaker had even taken to the floor.

He acknowledged that to be included in the Olympics, e-sports would first have to be recognised as a sport by the International Olympic Committee and he therefore set out reasons why this should happen. E-sports fulfilled the IOC’s meritocratic ideals, since they were played at internet cafés by many people in less developed countries, with one poor Pakistani citizen recently winning an e-sports tournament (and netting prize money of $6.3m).

For his part, Mipham stressed the need to move with the times and overcome outdated, stereotypical views of e-sports participants as “overweight men playing games”. They were, on the contrary, true athletes and, furthermore, they would help attract younger generations of supporters for the Olympics, promoting Olympic values to a wider audience.

In his summing-up, Akshat strongly challenged some of the major arguments against the motion. He pointed to shooting as a precedent – an example of an Olympic sport that required accuracy and skill, rather than great physical fitness. He also had an answer for those who criticised e-sports as too “gory”, highlighting the aggression inherent in boxing and fencing.

Broadcaster and journalist Jeremy Paxman brought with him his trademark combination of forthright frankness and well-informed opinion when he visited the School. He also brought his dog, Derek!

The 67-year-old question master from the BBC’s University Challenge made his name with his tough interviewing style on the corporation’s Newsnight.

When he came to the QE Politics Society event, the shoe was on the other foot, with boys from all year groups seizing the chance to grill the famous interviewer. However, that did not prevent some boys, including Politics Society Chairman Tej Mehta, from being ‘Paxmanned’ – robustly taken to task for the slant of their questions – albeit in very good humour.

The format of the visit, which was arranged by Head of Politics Liam Hargadon, was a question-and-answer session. Mr Paxman answered questions on a wide variety of subjects, including Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn, pollsters, the 2017 general election, social media, Donald Trump and, of course, Brexit.

The Headmaster said: “Mr Paxman was typically forthright, proffering honest and entertaining opinions on many of the key issues of the day.

“Such visits give our boys unique opportunities to learn from national and international experts. They also foster our pupils’ skills in asking good questions, which we see as an important aspect of developing boys’ intellectual capabilities – and who better to learn from than the master questioner himself?”

“Through interacting with somebody of Mr Paxman’s stature, they learn to think carefully and analytically, to articulate clearly and to stand firm in their arguments, while remaining willing to listen to differing views.

“I would like to thank him for his visit and also for the surprise visit of his cocker spaniel, who was a big hit with the boys.”

QE boys took the honours at a literature quiz, comfortably beating all the other schools in the competition.

QE entered two teams in the North London heat of the Kids’ Lit Quiz and, by half-way through the contest, they were competing closely for the lead, while standing some eight points ahead of the third-placed team.

English teacher Alex Ulyet said: “They held on to this right until the end and the only question was whether the Year 7 or Year 8 team would clinch the top spot, but Year 8 nudged in front by about two points.

“On the day both teams were fantastic. We were a little worried at first as it seemed every other table was celebrating every question they got right, whilst the two QE teams stayed relatively silent. This was, however, clearly just their calm, composed natures!”

The quiz heat at Queenswood School in Hatfield was part of the nationally run Kids’ Lit Quiz, which aims to test young people’s knowledge of literature. The two groups of four boys had prepared for the event in Monday lunchtime practice sessions overseen by Mr Ulyet and QE Librarian Ciara Murray. They were given questions based on known categories in the Kids’ Lit Quiz. These included, for example, sci-fi, mythology and fish.

Besides their performance in the main competition, the QE boys did extremely well in the bonus questions between rounds, several of them winning book tokens.

“Both teams seemed to really enjoy just being able to revel in their knowledge of children’s and young adult fiction. There was a sense that it left them with an even greater desire to go out and read some of the books which they heard questions about but had not yet read, which is of course the most important thing,” Mr Ulyet added.

The winning Year 8 team comprised: Yashaswar Kotakadi; Leo Dane-Liebesny; Ishaan Mehta and Conall Walker.

The Year 7 runners-up were: Parth Kapadia; Arjun Patel; Ewan Penhale and Siddharth Sridhar.

Leke Abolade is helping to inspire future generations of black Oxford University students through a new graduate alumni network.

The Oxford Black Alumni Network, which numbers more than 200 members, aims to connect black Oxford graduates from across the generations as well as inspiring current and future alumni “to fight for their causes and achieve common goals”, as its website puts it.

Leke (OE 2004–2011) was among a small group of members who were pictured at its launch – an image reproduced by major media outlets, including the Evening Standard and The Voice.

“The photoshoot was organised by members of the network, myself included, which has been created to highlight the inspiring and varied endeavours of Oxford alumni of black African and Caribbean heritage across fields including entrepreneurship, academia, and careers in the City, Law, media, tech, the arts and sports,” he says.

Naomi Kellman, the network’s co-chair, who took a PPE degree in 2011, told the Evening Standard: “There is still a concern among black students that if they apply, they might be the only one — they might think Oxford is not for ‘people like me’. But we want to show that’s not true. There is a long history of black students at Oxford doing well and being happy.”

After leaving QE, where he had enjoyed rugby with the Second XV, as well as singing in the Chamber Choir and playing with the Senior Strings, Leke went up to St Catherine’s College to read Engineering. In his four years in Oxford, he threw himself fully into student life, belonging to the university’s Amateur Boxing Club as well as its African Caribbean Society, Energy Society and Engineers Without Borders. He was also involved in St Catherine’s rugby, in the college choir and in a musical production, Chutney and Chips.

“Oxford was a fantastic educational experience and I want to ensure that prospective black students can believe this will be true for them as well,” he said.

Since graduating in 2015, he has worked in various roles, including a spell in the Osney Thermo-Fluids Laboratory within Oxford’s engineering faculty. Leke has spent most of 2017 working as a software developer with LexisNexis – a US company that works especially with law firms and other organisations operating in the legal sphere.

He is now carrying the objectives that inspired the formation of the new network into his professional life as well.  “Last year I began a career as a software developer and found myself in an industry that, like Oxford, has problems of under-representation,” he said. His response has been to volunteer as a coach in his spare time for Codebar – a non-profit initiative that runs programming workshops in a safe and collaborative environment to improve career opportunities for under-represented communities in technology.