Piers Linney happy to stay in Dragons’ Den

Dragons’ Den’s Piers Linney has revealed he has no interest in becoming the next Lord Sugar, with his own Apprentice-style show.

“Right now, I haven’t got the time,” he says. “I think Dragons’ Den is the only programme on television that communicates the best example of the business process, so I’m quite happy to do this for the foreseeable future.”

Piers - who joined the BBC2 series in 2013, replacing Theo Paphitis - also revealed how he is bombarded with pitches wherever he goes.

“I get pitched to a lot. You get pitched to everywhere - by the pool on holiday and in bars,” he added.

“Cab drivers all watch Dragons’ Den. I haven’t met a cabbie yet that hasn’t pitched me a business idea. You’ll be having a great unconnected conversation and it’ll go down a certain path, and you can hear the pitch coming. But I think it’s good. Everybody has a business in them and I find it fascinating to hear what people think of doing.”

Piers, co-CEO of cloud-based IT business Outsourcery, who launched his first business when he was 13, needed persuading by Sir Richard Branson to take the Dragons’ Den job.

“When they approached me, it wasn’t an immediate ‘yes’. I had a long, hard think about getting involved, the time commitment and the profile - the downside is you become public property,” he says.

The married dad-of-two added: “I was away with Sir Richard Branson on his private game reserve Ulusaba when the producers called. I asked him what he thought, and he said, ‘just do it’.”

Dragons’ Den continues on BBC2, Sunday, July 27, 8.00pm.