A MAN who co-created a free lottery using Emojis instead of numbers could become Entrepreneur of the Year.

James Genchi, whose Emoji Lottery has become a swift success, has been shortlisted for the award at this year’s Leeds Digital Festival.

The award is aimed at business-all-rounders who are constantly driving innovation, combining creative thinking and problem-solving to make their ideas a reality.

Web designer James set up Emoji Lottery with fellow digital worker Matt Mosley, announcing the bold concept of free money.

The online venture offers players a chance of winning prizes without paying an entry free, simply by entering their favourite emoji in a daily draw.

Emojis are tiny pictures used in mobile phone and computer messages to illustrate emotions and ideas, such as smiley faces or anger.

James said the site, emojilottery.com, made money entirely from advertising, with the added bonus of making monthly payments to good causes.

He said: “Emoji Lottery is going from strength to strength attracting players from all over the world.

“We have spent the past few months refining our user experience and redesigning Emoji Lottery in response to this growth. We are currently testing changes and rolling them out to our players.

“One of our players won an impressive £315, all without paying us a penny. She put the cash towards a holiday.”

James, 26, studied photography at Bradford College before working at a Keighley-based media company and later an agency in Leeds.

He is a self-taught web developer and designer, who in 2010, built a free web app that attracted more than five million downloads and generated revenue through advertising.

Matt, 29, moved from Derby to study New Media at the University of Leeds, and now works within the digital department of an agency in Leeds. The Leeds Digital Festival award ceremony was due to be held yesterday at Headrow House in Leeds.

A spokesman for the Leeds Digital Festival said that shortlisting the various categories in choosing winners was not an easy task.

He said: “There were so many worthy nominations submitted for so many people, organisations, companies and projects making a difference and driving digital in Leeds.”

Leeds Digital Festival started earlier this month and will run until Friday, April, 27.

Organisers boasted that it would be even bigger than last year’s festival, which saw 115 events during the festival week.

The spokesman said: “We’ve moved to a two-week festival so we can make more noise about the digital sector in Leeds, and give our companies and universities more opportunity to host events.”

Attractions this year have included FinTech North and Code in the Dark, as well as events based around data, healthtech, sports tech and startups.