Top 100 ideas for starting a new business

The Sunday Times has whittled down its entries in a competition for new business ideas to the top 100 proposals.

In its competition, 'One Minute Pitch', it reveals some of the practical or quirky ideas the finalists have dreamt up to win a prize of £100,000.

They include:

• an online employment agency for over-55s who have specialist or business skills and could offer short-term help to employers;
  a website to help drivers find parking spaces;
  
• Japanese-style capsule hotels, in airports so travellers can rest during stopovers;
  
• an internet business, which would deliver nutritious packed lunches to children at school;
  
• a 24-hour helpline manned by taxi drivers that will provide directions to people who are lost in London or stuck in traffic;
  
• a fitness machine that goes under a desk so that people could exercise while they were at work.
  
• a website called Scratchmyback.com where people could swap their talents or skills.