The entrepreneur Hilary Devey, who has died aged 65 from complications following a severe lung infection, built up personal wealth of more than £80m from a distribution company turning over £100m-plus a year. She was not only a trailblazer for women in business, but made her fortune in a male-dominated industry after setting up Pall-Ex in 1996 by selling her home and car to fund it after banks refused to lend her the money.
When the self-made millionaire joined the panel of investors on the BBC TV show Dragons’ Den in 2011, her straight talking, glamour and power suits seemed at odds with the image of logistics, lorry drivers and muddy yards. Kirsty Young, the Desert Island Discs radio host, remarked when she interviewed Devey in 2012 that she looked like she had “walked straight off the set of Dynasty – blood-red nails, killer shoulder pads and enough bling to make Alexis Carrington fume with jealousy”.
