22 hours Ago By Meghna Amin
Steven Bartlett has backed an Apprentice candidate who quit the rival series (Picture: BBC)An Apprentice candidate who dramatically quit the series has now received backing from Dragons’ Den star Steven Bartlett, and reached a new level of success.Dr Jana Denzel stunned viewers and Lord Alan Sugar when he made the difficult decision to walk away from the chance to win a £250,000 investment following a task in the competition.He claimed a ‘really hurtful’ comment from Lord Sugar had led to his exit, before sources alleged he felt as though he was being ‘set up to fail’.
However, Dr Jana has gone from strength to strength since leaving the show, and now treats the likes of celebrities at his London dental practice.Just a month after he quit The Apprentice (which came of his own accord after reports he’d been accused of using racist language following an incident), Dr Jana launched Denstudio, an award-winning Harley Street dental practice specialising in general and cosmetic dentistry.Get personalised updates on The Apprentice Wake up to find news on your TV shows in your inbox every morning with Metro’s TV Newsletter.
Sign up to our newsletter and then select your show in the link we’ll send you so we can get TV news tailored to you.Reflecting on his decision, he explained: ‘My business has only excelled since leaving the show. ‘I knew the environment wasn’t right for me, and I was itching to get back to my business.
Dr Jana Denzel walked out of Lord Alan Sugar’s boardroom (Picture: Ray Burmiston/Naked/BBC/PA Wire){"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Metro.co.
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‘The experience was invaluable, and it was an amazing opportunity to learn from my fellow contestants and Lord Sugar.‘I’ve applied many of the skills I learned to grow Denstudio. Ultimately, I had unwavering faith in my vision, and the success over the past year has proven that belief was well placed.
’The dentist quit the competition but has now reached new levels of success (Picture: BBC)With the support of entrepreneur and investor Steven, Jana was introduced to his commercial director and investment manager, Danny Gray, who is set to back the same business plan the contestant had initially prepared for Lord Sugar.‘We’ve been working on some pretty cool stuff, and that’s all thanks to Steven,’ the dentist had previously said.Since last year, Dr Jana’s company is turning over six figures, and with the last three months turnover, it is now valued into seven figures, Metro can confirm.
Steven’s help has led to Dr Jana’s company being valued at seven figures (Picture: Dr Jana Denzel)This comes after Dr Jana took to TikTok to clarify rumours and addressed the allegations he had used racist language, after claims he was spoken to about an ‘ill-informed’ remark he made about a character the team were digitally creating during a task – which saw production staff tell him his ‘use of language was not acceptable’.He told his followers that he’d been advised ‘not to say anything’ but wanted to clarify what had happened and ‘set the record straight’.‘On one of the tasks, I was in charge of creating a character for a particular industry I don’t often see people like me being represented in,’ he explained.
Dr Jana addressed the allegations in a video on TikTok (Picture: TikTok)He said he made the comment ‘with positive intent’, adding: ‘My entire motivation behind this character and the pitch around it was so we can see more diversity in that industry, particularly reflecting people that look like me.’Dr Jana was told by one of the other candidates at the time that he used the ‘wrong choice of words’, and was told to correct himself and say ‘character of colour’.‘I apologised, changed what I said, and carried on,’ Dr Jana said, adding that he wasn’t ‘reprimanded’ by producers, and after filming the series they got in touch to tell him of his ‘ill-informed choice of wording’ and offer him training which he took up,saying he ‘now has a better understanding of the use of that word’.
‘My business has only excelled since leaving the show,’ he’s said (Picture: Dr Jana Denzel)He added: ‘It had nothing to do with the reason of why I decided to leave the show, the timeline doesn’t make sense.‘I left the show, they finished filming the series, and after that they called me in, speak to me about my use of the ill-informed word and offered me more training.‘I wasn’t reprimanded or forced to do training, it was completely my choice and happened well after we finished filming.
’It was later claimed that he felt as though ‘he was being tripped up in tasks designed to make him look bad’, with a source telling The Sun that Dr Jana was ‘unhappy about how unfair and staged it felt’.The Apprentice airs Thursdays at 9pm, after Dragons’ Den at 8pm, on BBC One and iPlayer.Got a story?If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.
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