Amid tales of a faltering economy and company giants stumbling, it's all the more gratifying to feature those small UK businesses that can still provide us with positive tales about innovation and growth. One such example is Cradlesafe. Regardless of the recession, founder Paul Sommerville is pushing ahead with plans to have his baby breathing and movement monitors in shops, including Mothercare and Argos, by the end of the year.

It's taken an unfailing belief in his product and around £500,000 in "hard cash" for the 25-year-old from Lanarkshire to get from the concept he devised at school to where he is today. Since his patent application—"a tedious process"—in 2005, and registering the business later that year, he admits the challenges have been varied and often.

With hindsight, he says, he wouldn't have hopped on a plane, travelling with just a basic prototype of the product, to see manufacturers in Asia and expect to come back with a £1m deal. "It cost me a fortune," recalls Sommerville. "I was a bit naïve. I thought you could give it to a manufacturer and two weeks later you'd have a finished product. We're only at that stage now."

Nevertheless, he says he's always known that his concept—a baby monitor that constantly updates parents worried about cot death—is good. Other respiratory monitors only sound when breathing has stopped after 20 seconds. The backing of several organisations, either through funding (such as the £25,000 accelerator loan from the Prince's Scottish Youth Business Trust) or knowledge transfer has given the business legs.

Sommerville reels off the names of those involved: "A family friend owns a patent agency so he sat me down and went through the practical aspects. Gio Benedetti [a serial entrepreneur] saw the potential and made an offer to partner with us on distribution. And a multi-millionaire inventor [Bernard Frutin] is one of my shareholders."

Sommerville says the scope for growth is huge. He's set up a holding company, Safegroup, because he expects to design and manufacture more than just baby monitors. "We're branching into the care for the elderly market and medical markets. Although I have the design/inventor head on, I've realised I'm getting into the sales side." His focus now, with sales director Barry Collins, is to come up with a formidable brand to compete with established firms such as Tomy.

And he reckons the recession may do him a favour: "People have no money, stay at home and, you know, there are more babies around. People then spend their money on them. I can't say the recession is badly affecting us."