The company could float off up to 30 per cent of its stock, if it follows the example set by others in the same field.Mr Galatas says the partnership has been "working well" but there have been the "usual problems" He and Mr Huber are certainly not cut from the same cloth. The latter brings his missionary zeal for growth to the organisation, while the former is a representative of a major international bank."We are more concerned on the regulatory and administration side, they are more concerned with technology and fast decision-making," says Mr Galatas. Unlike Mr Huber's dress-down-Friday attire, which he wears every day, Mr Galatas, 38, is immaculately turned out in a crisp beige suit. His plush Madrid office, in BBVA's building, is where the pair thrashed out the details of their merger, codenamed Mickey Mouse, before it was announced to the markets.Mr Galatas denies BBVA runs the risk of seeing its own customers flock to Uno First. The Spanish and Latin-American group owns one-third of the internet bank, the other two-thirds are split equally between Terra Lycos and Enba.The latter has started three other business, besides Uno First. The others are Factor-e, providing electronic commerce back-office services for clients, Xelector, which allows visitors to compare financial services over the Web, and an investment fund to back online startup businesses with Wit Capital, the US investment bank.When Mr Huber is asked what drives him, he says he does not want to be famous.

His mother already frets about the dangers of him making the headlines in the financial press.He says: "The biggest driver is to create something that is a great business, which produces a profit and creates a lot of shareholder value. For 13 months we were self-financed, and with my partners we had eight families relying on our payroll, including my own, with no chance of any income. Nothing is certain with private equity, so there is a great personal risk and of course you want to have a reward for that."Through Enba, Mr Huber owns almost 2 per cent of Uno First group, worth about £20mWhen his is not working Mr Huber, who used play piano, listens to jazz, opera and rock "For me there is no separation of music There is only good music and bad music I do a lot of running. My partner Manuel Galatas is an extraordinary marathon runner He is an hour faster than I am. I run a marathon at around 3.30 and he runs at 2.30."But the pair will have to show Olympian speed, and the guts of a Athenian at the battle of Marathon to build an internet bank that will be a significant performer on the global stage. They are not the only ones in the race and there is a long way to go before anyone gets a medal.But not many of the rivals will have had to start in a suburban garage..

Even by the laid-back standards of the information technology industry, Mark Lancaster cuts an informal figure. The 38-year-old founder of SDL International wanders the converted Thames boathouse that serves as one of his main offices in scruffy jeans, trainers and company shirt Followed by the family dog. It is a long way from the popular image of the head of a publicly quoted company, even in the New Economy But Mr Lancaster is far from conventional. Even by the laid-back standards of the information technology industry, Mark Lancaster cuts an informal figure. The 38-year-old founder of SDL International wanders the converted Thames boathouse that serves as one of his main offices in scruffy jeans, trainers and company shirt Followed by the family dog. It is a long way from the popular image of the head of a publicly quoted company, even in the New Economy.

But Mr Lancaster is far from conventional. "When I first meet people I know 90 per cent think this is a tea-boy," he says "But when you start speaking that goes away. Because it's fairly evident you know what you're talking about." Is this an act designed to throw the unwary? After all, he is coming over like a student in the college bar and almost in the same breath stressing that his corporate background has been an important factor in putting SDL at the forefront of a rapidly developing area of communications technology.Maidenhead-based SDL translates computer games, websites and other forms of electronic communication from English to other languages. It has, for example, contracts with Microsoft, Sony PlayStation and the personal organiser maker Psion. "My vision has always been that people are not going to speak the same language," says Mr Lancaster "They are going to maintain their own language.