Julie Meyer is sitting in a\u00a0starkly lit attic, surrounded by piles of \u00a350 notes. A California blond in a crisp, white shirt, her long, stockinged legs crossed at the knee, she listens intently to the young man standing before her. As he talks, she sizes him up. Eventually, she tells him: \u201cI\u2019m\u00a0going to make you an offer.\u201d It\u00a0could be a\u00a0scene from a heist movie, but Meyer is in a BBC studio, shooting a\u00a02009 episode of the TV show Dragons\u2019\u00a0Den. A celebrated entrepreneur with a venture capital fund, she is ready to invest in whichever contestants catch her eye. For the viewers, she has some advice: \u201cWhat is success? A lot of it is self-belief. Continuing on when most rational people would stop.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is an online spin-off from the original Dragons\u2019 Den series, so the stakes are a little lower. But for Lex Deak, a 23-year-old with a big idea for a social media website, what happens in this room today could be make or break. He desperately wants to work with Meyer.<\/p>\n
During the dotcom boom that tore through London like tulip fever in the late 1990s, Meyer was a big name. Apple\u2019s brightly coloured iMacs were flying off the shelves, people were rushing to get online, and the web was becoming truly worldwide. For a short, thrilling moment, it felt as if anybody could start a tech business \u2013 and get filthy rich doing it.<\/p>\n
At the centre of it all was Meyer\u2019s monthly networking club, First Tuesday<\/a>, where young hustlers with little more than a concept and a funky brand name could raise millions on a handshake, as investors scrambled for a piece of the digital revolution. Along with Martha Lane Fox<\/a> and Brent Hoberman<\/a>, founders of the online travel agency Lastminute.com, Meyer became the face\u00a0of a\u00a0movement, the star of a golden generation that\u00a0was upending the male, pale and pinstriped world of British industry.<\/p>\n Accolades followed: the Davos forum named Meyer a \u201cglobal leader of tomorrow\u201d; the Wall Street Journal ranked her as one of the most influential businesswomen in Europe. She had a newspaper column, was recruited as a UK government adviser, and in 2012 was awarded an MBE.<\/p>\n For Deak, who had watched Dragons\u2019 Den religiously, taking notes in front of the TV, Meyer seemed the ideal mentor. When she offered \u00a320,000 for a stake in his venture, Family Fridge (like Facebook, but for families), he didn\u2019t hesitate to say yes. \u201cI was very keen to get her involvement, but very naive,\u201d he says now. She gave him space in her office and introduced him to people. But the money? He never saw a penny.<\/p>\n Meyer in Dragons\u2019 Den Online, 2009. Photograph: Mark Harrison\/ BBC<\/p>\n \u201cI was primed and ready to be the young, talked\u2011about tech entrepreneur. I\u2019d been nominated as a rising star by the Institute of Directors. At the time, it felt like she had stolen an opportunity from me \u2026 it created a fork in my trajectory. She definitely did me a wrong-un.\u201d<\/p>\n Deak says Meyer never gave him a straight no; she just kept asking him to revise the business plan. Of\u00a0course, not all deals agreed on air work out \u2013 many fall through after the show, during the due diligence process. As time passed, however, Deak found himself offering support to a growing circle of people who say they were damaged by their own dealings with Meyer.<\/p>\n Over the years, the one-time queen of the dotcom scene has left a trail of trouble in her wake, with a series of failed ventures that entangled everyone from the former chair of Marks & Spencer to the prime minister of Malta. The Guardian has seen evidence of insolvent companies, unpaid wages, debts to suppliers and millions in lost investments. Those who admired and\u00a0trusted her say they have been left with burning regrets, describing a seemingly endless cycle of seduction and betrayal.<\/p>\n A former associate describes Meyer as a \u201cprofessional confidence trickster\u201d. For her ex-boyfriend and business partner, the Swiss millionaire Ren\u00e9 Eichenberger, she is a \u201cmaster of manipulation and false narratives \u2026 Once she gets exposed in one country, she finds new supporters who believe in her and help her move on to the next jurisdiction.\u201d<\/p>\n In recent months, the Guardian has heard allegations of a darker nature against Meyer. Investors and founders say they have lost hundreds of thousands in three separate incidents, which they describe as scams.<\/p>\n Meyer did not respond to requests for comment. She\u00a0has previously rejected any suggestion her activities are not above board. In her marketing, she describes herself as \u201cone of Europe\u2019s leading backers of entrepreneurs\u201d, who has spent decades identifying transformational companies.<\/p>\n Despite years of controversy, she has kept the show on the road, hiring new teams and starting new ventures, all while releasing an endless stream of social media content to maintain her profile and seek out fresh contacts. \u201cThis will continue until the public sees who Julie Meyer really is,\u201d says Eichenberger.<\/p>\n In a year-long investigation, the Guardian has followed the trail to London, Malta, Switzerland and Greece, gathering accounts from dozens of former staff, business associates and entrepreneurs. By speaking out, they hope their stories can serve as a warning.<\/p>\n London<\/p>\n If there was one place for a young and hungry entrepreneur to be in the late 90s, it was London: a\u00a0Silicon Valley breeze was blowing into town, and the city was at the centre of Europe\u2019s first internet frenzy. Tony Blair had entered Downing Street at the head of the\u00a0first Labour government in 18 years, and the capital was swinging to the beat of the Cool Britannia pop\u2011culture revival.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was fabulously exciting,\u201d recalls the author and former BBC tech journalist Rory Cellan-Jones. \u201cI\u00a0mean, the polar opposite of going to BP\u2019s annual general meeting. There were a lot of parties. There were people becoming rich overnight in a way that we in this country were absolutely not used to.\u201d<\/p>\n It was into this heady atmosphere that Julie Marie Meyer, armed with a US accent and a master\u2019s from France\u2019s prestigious Insead business school, first arrived in the UK.<\/p>\n Born in Michigan in 1966, she was raised in a\u00a0small\u2011town suburb of Sacramento in California. Her father, a physician, insisted on a religious upbringing. According to Meyer\u2019s own origin story, after graduating she left for Paris with $1,000 in her pocket. Meyer often recounts her parting words to her father, who saw her off at the airport. \u201cHe turned to my stepmother and he said, \u2018Don\u2019t worry, she\u2019ll be back soon. She doesn\u2019t have that much money.\u2019 And I spun around and said, \u2018You watch, I\u2019m gonna live over there the rest of my life. I\u00a0don\u2019t need your money.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Meyer spent a decade in France, jumping from one job to another, before securing her master\u2019s. Recounting those years in a blog<\/a>, she says she became \u201cobsessed with making money\u201d. One day she was out driving with her boyfriend \u2013 15 years her senior \u2013 when he pulled over and told her: \u201cStop talking about money. If you are good at something and focused on it, the money will find you.\u201d<\/p>\n Meyer (on right) during a panel discussion with Martha Lane Fox and Brent Hoberman, the co\u2011founders of Lastminute.com, at the Times newspaper\u2019s CEO summit in London in 2015. Photograph: Jack Hill<\/p>\n Meyer didn\u2019t wait to be found. She crossed the Channel\u00a0in 1998 and joined a venture capital firm where the\u00a0boss, Thomas Teichman<\/a>, reportedly rode a micro\u2011scooter in the office. Their hottest new\u00a0investment was a\u00a0travel website offering discount\u00a0holiday deals. In March 2000, after just a few months of trading, Lastminute.com would make history by floating on the London stock market at a valuation of \u00a3571m.<\/p>\n Hoberman, Lastminute\u2019s co-founder, had been approached to help run a networking business pairing tech-company founders with potential investors. Too\u00a0busy to do it himself, he pitched the idea to Meyer. \u201cShe was very outgoing, she was very good at convening people,\u201d he says. \u201cI thought she was an operator, in the sense that she was a real networker.\u201d<\/p>\n And so Meyer opened her address book and hit the phones. On the first Tuesday of October 1998, about 80\u00a0people gathered at the uber-hip Alphabet bar in Beak Street, Soho, London. \u201cFrom that original meeting grew an organisation that was to spawn many of the dotcom investments of the following 18\u00a0months and itself grow into a multinational business,\u201d Cellan\u2011Jones wrote in dot.bomb, his ringside account of an extraordinary period.<\/p>\n Hoberman and Lane Fox spoke at the second event, in November, while entrepreneurs with green dots on their name badges mingled with investors with red dots, looking to cut deals. Soon, the parties were so popular, they were hiring Lord\u2019s cricket club. A\u00a0chief executive was recruited, an American called Reade Fahs. He says he wanted the job because First Tuesday really stood for something; it was \u201ccommerce with a\u00a0cause\u201d. He\u00a0describes Meyer as the driving force: \u201cIf you had to pick one person to give credit for First Tuesday to, it\u00a0would be Julie \u2026 I hand it to her. She had vision.\u201d<\/p>\n In the space of two years, Meyer and her co-founders turned First Tuesday from a cocktail party into a\u00a0company and franchised it around the world. They claimed to have helped raise more than $147m (\u00a398m) for startups, including the fashion retailer Boo.com and the beauty site Clickmango.<\/p>\n A self-described workaholic whose political views were firmly on the right, Meyer liked to describe First Tuesday as \u201cmy revenge on socialism\u201d. But it was a short-lived triumph. In March 2000, stock market screens around the world flashed red. The dotcom bubble had burst. By June, Meyer\u2019s investors were pushing for a sale, hoping to recoup their money. An Israeli company offered $50m in cash and shares. Meyer wanted to hold out and keep going, but her male co-owners thought it was a good deal, and she was out-voted.<\/p>\n In the years that followed, she would often talk of being dismissed and underestimated by men. In\u00a02015, she told Harper\u2019s Bazaar: \u201cI think I\u2019ve always been inherently distrustful of people telling me I can\u2019t do things.\u201d Proving her doubters wrong became a\u00a0motivating force.<\/p>\n If First Tuesday was her revenge on socialism, Meyer\u2019s next venture, Ariadne Capital, was about showing the world she could make it on her own. In\u00a0a\u00a02002 interview with the Guardian<\/a>, headlined \u201cNet\u2019s queen bee still buzzes\u201d, she set out her stall. Ariadne would host networking events and earn fees advising startups on how to find backers. It would also make some investments of its own.<\/p>\n As Ariadne grew, its boss spent lavishly. Meyer\u2019s team moved to \u00a310,000-a-month offices just off Trafalgar Square. For Meyer, there was a chauffeur-driven car, a personal trainer and two personal assistants \u2013 one at the office and a second to keep house. Successful businesswomen had to look the part, she told Harper\u2019s Bazaar. \u201cDuring the week, I wear \u2026 Ralph Lauren, Mulberry, Michael Kors \u2026 and Roland Mouret.\u201d She saw her facialist \u2013 an expert in Indian alternative medicine \u2013 every Saturday \u201cwithout fail\u201d.<\/p>\n In 2009, Meyer launched her venture capital arm \u2013 Ariadne Capital Entrepreneurs<\/a> \u2013 the ACE fund, for short. Edward Wray, founder of the gambling group Betfair, was among the high-profile backers.<\/p>\n Rachel Lowe was hired in 2012, to help advise startups. When she arrived at the Ariadne offices, she says she found herself entering \u201ca temple to Julie\u201d: framed pictures of Meyer lined the walls. While the boss looked the part, Lowe says the organisation felt chaotic. \u201cEverything was just an absolute mess,\u201d she recalls. \u201cThere were just a lot of young people who didn\u2019t know what the hell they were doing.\u201d<\/p>\n Meyer, says Lowe, had a tendency to explode with rage at staff: \u201cI knew whether Julie was in the office just through feeling something in the air \u2026 She ruled by fear.\u201d Towards her, however, Lowe says Meyer was sweetness and light. At least, at first.<\/p>\n double quotation markThe Ariadne investment I looked at was snake oil. She understood about fundraising and schmoozing, but she did not understand the tech startup space at allMeyer in 2010. Photograph: Micha Theiner\/Cityam\/ Shutterstock<\/p>\n After a few months without problems, Lowe says Meyer began making excuses for not paying her invoices, eventually accusing Lowe of poor performance. Lowe brought a legal claim against her. The judge ruled in\u00a0Lowe\u2019s favour and awarded her approximately \u00a326,000 plus interest and costs. By then, multiple staff and suppliers were also claiming to have not been paid.\u00a0A PR agency sued for about \u00a376,000, and settled out of court.<\/p>\n Writing anonymously on the recruitment website Glassdoor, a former employee claimed Meyer would sometimes hide from her creditors. \u201cOnce, when a\u00a0supplier came to the office demanding payment, she snuck out down the fire escape.\u201d (Meyer has previously said of the Glassdoor reviews: \u201cThere are a lot of people much more important than me who get written up on anonymous websites. Comes with the territory.\u201d)<\/p>\n By the summer of 2017, Ariadne could no longer afford the rent on its offices. The staff were sent to work from home.<\/p>\n So where did it all go wrong? It seems the vision never quite matched the reality. At first, Meyer had talked of pulling in \u00a360m for her ACE fund, but an investor report circulated in 2017 put the final total invested at just \u00a37.6m. Controversially, the report states that more than half the money raised \u2013 \u00a34.4m \u2013 was spent buying a 100% share in one of Meyer\u2019s own ventures.<\/p>\n None of Ariadne\u2019s investments produced a big return, and many resulted in a loss. A former employee, asked to put a value on a software firm Ariadne had invested in, says: \u201cWhen I looked at it, it was snake oil. She understood about fundraising and schmoozing, but she did not understand the tech startup space at all.\u201d<\/p>\n Under pressure from creditors, Ariadne went into administration in December 2017. Those with shares in the ACE fund found they were worthless. Meyer said at the time: \u201cI remain deeply sorry that it was necessary for\u00a0me to put the company into administration, especially given the consequences for employees and unsecured creditors.\u201d<\/p>\n A separate group of investors \u2013 which included Stuart Rose, the former boss of Marks & Spencer \u2013 also say they lost out. Lawyers acting for the group would later allege that funds intended for investment in a digital marketing startup were paid into a bank account controlled by Meyer, and subsequently misappropriated to fund Ariadne Capital.<\/p>\n In their report, administrators for Ariadne found no assets, other than a few investments that they valued at just \u00a32,528. Hundreds of thousands were owed to employees, a similar amount to the tax office \u2013 and a\u00a0chunky \u00a37,500 to the taxi firm Addison Lee. For Meyer, though, this was not the moment to throw in the towel.<\/p>\n Malta<\/p>\n While accountants untangled the mess in London, Meyer was already on to her next venture. By\u00a0the summer of 2017, she had installed herself in\u00a0a\u00a0suite at Malta\u2019s five-star Westin Dragonara hotel. On the top floor, her staff commandeered the business centre as a temporary office.<\/p>\n She acquired a Maltese company with a licence to manage investments. Soon, she was telling the press that Ariadne Capital Malta was going to raise a \u20ac1bn European fund.<\/p>\n To attract the cash, she needed to make some noise. So Meyer convened a summit, assembling startups and big money investors from around Europe. The prime minister of Malta spoke at the glittering summer launch,\u00a0in the ballroom of the Dragonara hotel. On the terrace afterwards, Meyer held court, smiling as investors milled around, ready to open their chequebooks.<\/p>\n The event had been a huge success, but behind the scenes there were new allegations that Meyer wasn\u2019t paying the bills. Mark Lightfoot, whose design agency had been hired for the event, says he was owed \u20ac60,000 for unpaid invoices. He says Meyer had initially explained it away, blaming technical issues, and he believed she would do right by him eventually. \u201cIn my mind, it was, like, here\u2019s a chance to prove myself. She is a big, swanky American investor who\u2019s over here in little old Malta.\u201d<\/p>\n double quotation markThe restructuring was, she said, \u2018all legitimate \u2026 Nothing in London. Everything in Malta. Julie 1, universe 0\u2019<\/p>\n He says that when Meyer offered to settle for half the amount owed, he realised his mistake and started legal proceedings, getting a judge to freeze her bank accounts. Emails suggest she hit back hard, telling his lawyer the family assets were at risk: \u201cIf \u2026 the entire Lightweight [sic] clan don\u2019t want to experience a multi\u2011generational destruction of wealth, I strongly advise a fast publication of my proposed apology \u2026 I\u00a0am so totally not joking.\u201d Lightfoot dropped the claim, figuring a favourable court ruling was no guarantee of payment.<\/p>\n Meyer has previously rejected the allegations of non-payment, telling the newspaper City AM in 2022: \u201cI don\u2019t remember Mark Lightfoot. I\u2019ve been in business for 30\u00a0years, and don\u2019t always remember names \u2026 We\u00a0always pay people their salaries.\u201d<\/p>\n By November, sources say there was a big hotel bill to be settled. The bang on the door of suite 514 came in the early hours. It was the night manager, and he had a police officer with him. Meyer\u2019s two personal assistants awoke with a start. Reception had let them in the previous day and they had spent the evening packing.<\/p>\n Meyer, who was not there, had emailed her PAs a\u00a0room plan, with instructions: \u201cTake everything in the drawers under the TV. All shoes in both closets \u2026 the more important clothes \u2013 expensive ones that I\u00a0need now \u2026 Bring the princess crown in the safe, which is open.\u201d<\/p>\n According to the email, they were to pack a couple of cases and leave the rest. They should avoid doing anything to \u201craise alarm that we\u2019re doing a runner, and I\u2019m fleeing the country \u2026 Be super-friendly to the staff\u00a0in the hallway and don\u2019t allow them to think there\u2019s\u00a0anything up.\u201d<\/p>\n So when the assistants opened the door to the night manager, they stuck to the script, convincing the police officer that all was well. According to one of the assistants, who asked not to be named, the journey home was difficult: \u201cI felt like everyone was watching us at that moment. Even at the airport people were staring at us,\u201d she says. \u201cI was, like, \u2018Let\u2019s just get out of this country as soon as possible.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Meyer still wasn\u2019t ready to call it a day in Malta. In February 2018, she sent a message to her staff WhatsApp group, the one called \u201cInner Circle\u201d. In it, she described a\u00a0\u201cmajor pivotal transaction\u201d shifting Ariadne\u2019s assets out of the UK. \u201cI AM NOT BLOND,\u201d she proclaimed. The restructuring was, she said, \u201call legitimate \u2026 Nothing in London. Everything in Malta. Julie 1, universe 0.\u201d<\/p>\n The celebrations were short-lived. In Malta, not paying wages is a criminal offence, and the state brought several cases of alleged non-payment to court. After Meyer failed to attend a hearing in April 2018, a magistrate ordered the police commissioner to locate her within 48 hours, using all resources at their disposal.<\/p>\n By May, Malta\u2019s financial regulator had suspended Ariadne\u2019s fund management licence. Less than a\u00a0year after its extravagant debut, the Mediterranean adventure was at an end. Meyer had managed to smuggle a tiara out of a hotel, but her crown was well and truly slipping.<\/p>\n Switzerland<\/p>\n Simon Davis, a 51-year-old entrepreneur from Johannesburg, will never forget the day he had to call his investors to tell them the bad news. At his request, they had transferred more than $200,000 to a Swiss law firm retained by Meyer, and it was all gone. \u201cShe just walked off with the money,\u201d says Davis.<\/p>\n His South African company, ScarabTech<\/a>, makes compact machines that communities can use to turn their plastic waste into fuel. They were looking for funding to hire more staff. Someone mentioned Meyer, and Davis recognised her name immediately. Nearly 30\u00a0years before, as a young man working in London, he had attended a First Tuesday gathering at the Science Museum. He got in touch, and she invited him to her latest investor event to pitch his idea.<\/p>\n Meyer at a First Tuesday e-commerce meeting at Bloomberg. Photograph: Tom Jenkins\/The Guardian<\/p>\n By now, Meyer had moved to Zurich. It was Eichenberger, a Swiss judo enthusiast who had made\u00a0a\u00a0fortune in aviation, who suggested the move. They had met decades before, and when Meyer reconnected with him in 2018, Eichenberger says they became a couple.<\/p>\n She founded another new venture, Viva Investment Partners, a Swiss-registered company modelled on Ariadne. Eichenberger took a stake, and some of the old shareholders from London were even given a share. Meyer had a six-figure salary, a company flat in the best part of town, and a company credit card for meals, clothes and hair salons, according to documents seen by the Guardian.<\/p>\n From her office overlooking Lake Zurich, Meyer went back to what she knew best \u2013 hosting events for startups in search of capital. The gathering attended by Davis, in January 2025, was small. But he was impressed: a handful of serious investors had come to hear the pitches. Meyer, it seems, still has valuable connections.<\/p>\n Afterwards, he says she approached him with a\u00a0proposal: Viva was planning a new fund, to back a\u00a0select group of startups, and ScarabTech had made the cut. Documents suggest she dangled the prospect of a $900,000 investment in his company.<\/p>\n He stayed in the apartment next to hers, and says they spent the next few weeks refining the business plan. They would work late into the night, speaking on the phone until 2am. \u201cShe certainly applied her mind. She made you feel like you were doing it together. Which we were.\u201d ScarabTech\u2019s existing backers and a\u00a0new investor agreed to join the fundraising, putting in $200,000 \u2013 and Davis added $36,000 of his own.<\/p>\n In May 2025, he received a letter from Meyer: the deal was off. There would be no investment in ScarabTech due to what she said were concerns about inaccurate and incomplete numbers, and issues with the startup\u2019s existing shareholders. She said she had been hoping to make a \u201cgood investment\u201d, but that Davis had failed to take on any feedback, adding: \u201cThis has been a huge disappointment to me and my team.\u201d<\/p>\n double quotation markMy heart sank. I still had some outside hope that maybe she made an error, but, no, there was no error<\/p>\n When Davis asked for the money he had raised from his existing backers to be returned, he received an unexpected invoice. Meyer wanted 162,000 Swiss francs (\u00a3145,000) in \u201csuccess fees\u201d, \u201ccorporate infrastructure fees\u201d and \u201cmanagement fees\u201d. Davis is clear \u2013 he says he never engaged Meyer to provide these services.<\/p>\n Meyer sent emails threatening legal action: \u201cIn very clear language: if you do anything to hurt my firm, I will hold you and each of your board directors \u2026 directly liable for the damage,\u201d she warned.<\/p>\n Frantic, Davis approached the Swiss law firm whose account had been used for the payments. He says they told him the cash was gone. The Guardian understands that at Meyer\u2019s request, the funds were transferred to an account in Lithuania.<\/p>\n \u201cMy heart sank. I still had some outside hope that maybe she made an error, but, no, there was no error,\u201d Davis remembers. He produced a report for his investors, alleging \u201ccross-border fraud and intimidation\u201d. He\u00a0notified the police in South Africa and the FBI in Delaware, US, where his company is registered, but no investigations were opened. He also notified police in\u00a0the UK and they closed the case on 13 January 2026, after determining that there were insufficient lines of inquiry to follow.<\/p>\n The Guardian has examined two similar cases, both in 2023, involving a price comparison site from the Middle East and a craft gin company from Barcelona. Investors and founders say the money for the startups \u2013 more than $200,000 in total \u2013 was transferred to Meyer, but then it vanished, with the startups claiming they received nothing.<\/p>\n Eichenberger says he no longer speaks to Meyer. At\u00a0first, they worked well together. He says he even helped settle her legal disputes with suppliers and former employees, one by one. Lawyers in Malta confirm the criminal cases have been closed.<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t long, however, before problems surfaced. He says the events were losing money, and an acquisition by Viva of a UK software company turned\u00a0sour. Drive Software Solutions was wound up in 2023 and\u00a0the\u00a0liquidator\u2019s report, filed last year, raises serious questions about missing pensions money. It\u00a0seems\u00a0that\u00a0contributions were deducted from\u00a0staff \u00a0wages, but never paid into a scheme.<\/p>\n When Meyer\u2019s split with Eichenberger came, it was explosive. The pair have been embroiled in numerous legal battles over assets and shareholdings since they parted. He remains a shareholder in Viva, having not found a buyer for his stake.<\/p>\n For her part, Meyer has rejected Eichenberger\u2019s criticisms, telling a newspaper in 2022<\/a> that he \u201chas an agenda to damage the firm, and is hostile to us, which is why he is gone\u201d.<\/p>\n Many of those who have come forward to tell their stories are a resilient bunch. Davis has moved on to other ventures. Lowe lives in the south of France and runs a vinyl record company. Deak has launched one tech business after another. His latest is a shopping app backed by Mumsnet founder Justine Roberts.<\/p>\n But not everyone has bounced back.<\/p>\n Greece<\/p>\n Along the sea road, among the warehouses, the building site stands empty. Construction ground to a\u00a0halt months ago, after the foundations were laid.<\/p>\n Malcolm Williams, 57, had wanted to put something back into the community where he was raised, on the South Atlantic island of Saint Helena. He founded The\u00a0Green Fish Company, and set about raising money to build a tuna processing plant. Searching for backers, he was introduced to Meyer and invited to present the plan at her 2024 summer networking event in Greece. When not in Switzerland, sources say Meyer spends much of the year in Athens, or on the island of Kea, where she owns a villa named Carpe Diem.<\/p>\n Williams forked out thousands of euros to attend. When he arrived, he was disappointed. Instead of talking to a room full of venture capitalists, he found himself pitching to other founders. The promised entertainment \u2013 a yacht and gala dinner \u2013 turned out to be no more than a ride in a couple of small motor boats and some sandwiches.<\/p>\n A letter of engagement shared by Williams, who spent thousands more attending another event and a meeting in Dubai, suggests Meyer had dangled the prospect of a \u20ac500,000 \u201cminimum\u201d investment by Viva \u2013 subject to due diligence. The investment never materialised. Two years later, he is still struggling to recover, and the tuna plant remains unbuilt.<\/p>\n The planned site for The Green Fish Company tuna-processing plant on Saint Helena, where construction has been halted<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re back to square one,\u201d he says. \u201cWe should have had our business up and running by now, you know, and we\u2019ve just wasted time \u2026 It kicks the trust out of you.\u201d<\/p>\n Those who are drawn into Meyer\u2019s orbit all share one thing: a powerful desire to succeed. They say Meyer has learned to exploit that desire.<\/p>\n This investigation has uncovered 17 legal claims against Meyer and her companies from employees, contractors and suppliers who say they were owed money, and a 2024 extract from the debt register in\u00a0Switzerland lists dozens of creditors, including a florist, photographers and a hotel in the St Moritz ski resort. Lightfoot, who has been tracking Meyer\u2019s activities for years, believes the total number of people claiming to have not been paid by her could run into the hundreds. <\/p>\n double quotation markThe business world is full of those who stand accused of crossing the line from hustle to heist. What makes Meyer different is that she once stood for something \u2013 \u2018commerce with a cause\u2019<\/p>\n The UK\u2019s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), which had issued licences to Ariadne in the UK, launched an inquiry into Meyer and her UK companies. Codenamed operation Hibbing, it looked at whether rules around managing investments may have been breached. The probe ran for five years and took evidence from numerous associates of Meyer, before being shut down in\u00a02023. A\u00a0spokesperson for the FCA says: \u201cWe\u00a0sympathise with those who lost money in the collapse of the firm. We investigated this case fully. There was insufficient evidence at the time to bring criminal charges, but we are always willing to consider any new evidence.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2022, Meyer was found in contempt of court. She had hired the blue-chip law firm Farrer & Co in a bid to close down negative publicity, and then neglected to pay the fees. They sued for about \u00a3200,000<\/a>, and a\u00a0warrant was issued for her arrest after she failed to attend hearings. After that, the University of Warwick<\/a> annulled her honorary doctorate. Last summer, her MBE was withdrawn. On her LinkedIn page, however, she still styles herself Dr Julie Meyer MBE.<\/p>\n Davis says that, on some level, Meyer still yearns to be a successful businesswoman. \u201cI think she wants a\u00a0win. So she works for that, but if it doesn\u2019t work, she\u2019s got the insurance policy of knowing she can just take the money anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n Lightfoot believes she is dishonest. \u201cShe is a\u00a0confidence trickster; there\u2019s nothing more to it than that. Her chosen field is the world of venture capital and entrepreneurship. And she\u2019s figured out a formula, her playbook, and it works for her.\u201d<\/p>\n The business world is full of those who stand accused of crossing the line from hustle to heist. What makes Meyer different is that she once stood for something \u2013 \u201ccommerce with a cause\u201d, as Fahs put it; changing the world by backing the best new ideas. It is a reputation that she still trades on, a story she still seems to tell herself. And so she continues on, long after most rational people would have stopped.<\/p>\n So far this year, Meyer has advertised a\u00a0\u201cMediterranean Summit: Longevity, Tech Bio, MedTech, Wellness\u201d<\/a> at her base on the Greek island of Kea, and several investment events in Zurich. In January, she charged \u00a34,000 a head for a two-day gathering, promising to connect startups with \u201cinvestors, industrialists, financiers and fund managers\u201d. For another \u00a34,000, delegates could access the \u201cpre\u2011summit\u201d with a specially curated programme featuring snow polo and a Swiss village tour.<\/p>\n The allegations in this article have all been put to Meyer, but she did not respond to them. The Guardian eventually caught up with her near her flat in Zurich, on a sunny afternoon in late January, as she was preparing to host a drinks party for her latest networking event. With a leopard-print coat and sparkling black trousers, blond hair spilling over her shoulders, she was, as ever, dressed to impress.<\/p>\n Instead of a designer handbag, however, she was holding the handle of an orange plastic shopping trolley.\u00a0The bottles inside clinked as it rolled over the\u00a0cobble stones. She seemed a cut-price version of the First Tuesday queen bee, unable to engage with the reality of her fall from grace.<\/p>\n Asked about the many allegations made against her, about the loss of her MBE, she paused for a moment, before insisting, in her unmistakable California accent, that we had the wrong person: \u201cI\u2019m not who you think I\u00a0am. I\u2019m doing some shopping here \u2026 Could you please leave me alone? I\u2019m not Julie Meyer.\u201d<\/p>\n Additional reporting: David Pegg<\/p>\n Think like a billionaire, a two-part series about Julie Meyer from the Guardian\u2019s Today in Focus podcast<\/a>, is\u00a0available now. (Subscribe to Today in Focus wherever you get your podcasts.)<\/p>\n Get in touch<\/p>\n Contact our investigations team<\/p>\n The best public interest journalism relies on first-hand accounts from people in the know. If you have something to share on this subject, you can contact us confidentially using the following methods:<\/p>\n Secure Messaging in the Guardian app<\/p>\n The Guardian app has a tool to send tips about stories. Messages are end to end encrypted and concealed within the routine activity that every Guardian mobile app performs. This prevents an observer from knowing that you are communicating with us at all, let alone what is being said.<\/p>\n If you don\u2019t already have the Guardian app, download it (iOS<\/a>\/Android<\/a>) and go to the menu. Select \u2018Secure Messaging\u2019. <\/p>\n SecureDropIf you can safely use the tor network without being observed or monitored you can send messages and documents to the Guardian via our SecureDrop platform.<\/a><\/p>\n