In a world where rapid technological change meets heavily regulated industries, true innovation requires more than just cutting-edge tools—it demands deep domain insight, strategic foresight, and unwavering purpose. For over two decades, this founder has been driving transformative change across utilities, telecoms, and technology by building what didn’t yet exist: the capabilities, systems, and thinking needed to align innovation with impact. Rather than simply launching a company, they built a mission—to reimagine how utilities approach operations, compliance, and customer engagement. Today, their business serves as a trusted transformation partner, helping organisations navigate complexity through AI-powered solutions, collaborative ecosystems, and adaptive frameworks. In this interview, they share insights from their journey—covering everything from the strategic role of AI to overcoming procurement inertia and building a culture of leadership, learning, and long-term value.
Can you describe your entrepreneurial journey and the motivation behind starting your business?
I believe that being an entrepreneur does not always mean opening up a new business, someone can be entrepreneur enough in an agile and forward-looking organisation. This reflect in my journey where I have built new organisational units in companies and sectors where capabilities were missing or needed improvement. My entrepreneurial journey has been over two decades, delivering transformation across utilities, telecoms, and technology. I saw first-hand the challenges businesses faced in aligning strategy with scalable, innovative solutions—particularly within regulated industries. This inspired me to launch focused solutions with differentiated digital solutions for the utilities sectors, with a unique blend of regulatory insight, AI capability, and practical transformation delivery. Goal is simple: to reimagine the way utilities think about operations, compliance, consumption, and customer engagement.
How do you stay ahead of technological advancements in your industry, and how has this impacted your business model?
We stay ahead by combining deep domain expertise with a relentless curiosity for emerging technologies—and more importantly, by translating that insight into real-world value. In highly regulated industries like utilities, innovation must be both visionary and viable. That’s why we invest heavily in horizon scanning, academic collaboration, and scenario-based planning to anticipate what’s coming next, not just react to it.
A key enabler of this is our work with academic institutions, where we co-develop concepts like the Digital Twins, blending AI, modelling, and geospatial data to create smarter, more sustainable decisions. These projects not only give us a head start on new tech but also help shape how future standards and use cases emerge.
Proactive stance influence business models. We operate with modularity and agility at the core—able to plug into different client landscapes or regulatory frameworks with minimal friction. Rather than waiting to respond to technology cycles, we focus on co-creation and system enablement—helping clients prepare their landscape before a big vendor or system integrator arrives. This way, we de-risk large programmes, accelerate time to value, and ensure that technology adoption is always grounded in business context.
Ultimately, staying ahead in tech isn’t about chasing trends—it’s about anticipating shifts, building capability early, and shaping ecosystems that are ready to evolve.
What role does artificial intelligence play in your current operations or future plans?
Artificial Intelligence is not just a tool for us—it’s a strategic pillar that underpins our entire value proposition. We use AI to move beyond traditional automation and into the realm of intelligent transformation. This means reimagining how critical processes work, identifying inefficiencies, and designing systems that are predictive, adaptive, and context aware.
For instance, in the utilities sector, building next-generation asset management platforms that use AI to interpret telemetry data, predict failure patterns, and guide proactive maintenance. This significantly reduces downtime and optimizes investment in ageing infrastructure.
Another powerful use case is compliance accountability solution for regulated companies, developed in light of increasing regulatory scrutiny and potential criminal liability for CEOs. Here, AI powers decision-logic tracking, ensures full auditability of operational and regulatory workflows, and enables dynamic delegation of responsibilities. It’s not just about compliance—it’s about building trust in decision-making chains.
Looking ahead, AI will continue to shape how we think about customer models, consumption frameworks, and regulatory impact. We are already piloting the use of AI in digital twins, where it helps simulate complex environmental interactions and test policy or infrastructure interventions before they’re implemented in the real world.
Ultimately, AI gives us the ability to build domain-led intelligence into our solutions—aligning innovation with purpose, and helping our clients not just keep up, but lead.
Absolutely — here’s an expanded version that captures the nuance of your original response, while also addressing the deeper organizational and procurement barriers you mentioned:
Can you share a significant challenge you’ve faced in your business and how you overcame it?
One of the most persistent challenges we’ve faced is breaking through the inherent conservatism of the procurement processes, particularly when it comes to adopting innovation. Even when senior leadership buys into the concept and sees the value, there’s often a gap between conceptual alignment and organizational readiness to act.
The reality is that many companies are structured around legacy procurement processes and risk-averse governance models—systems that are optimised for stability and compliance, not experimentation or speed. Procurement teams are often constrained by frameworks that struggle to accommodate emerging tech or co-innovation models. As a result, even high-impact ideas can stall or be deprioritized due to structural inertia.
We overcame this by focusing on trust-building through strategic alignment. Rather than pushing innovation in isolation, we aligned ourselves with credible partners—including leading audit firms, global technology providers, and academic institutions. This created an ecosystem of assurance, where innovation was not just visionary, but grounded in compliance, evidence, and expertise.
We also refined our go-to-market approach to deliver early, tangible wins—whether through rapid MVPs, regulatory proof points, or operational pilots. By showing measurable outcomes within a matter of weeks—not months—we were able to build internal momentum and expand stakeholder confidence beyond the innovation champions.
Perhaps most importantly, we positioned ourselves as System Enablers, helping organisations prepare the groundwork for transformation before formal procurement cycles even begin. This means clarifying solution fit, aligning to regulatory and commercial goals, and de-risking innovation for the business side—making the path forward easier for procurement to justify.
Over time, this approach has allowed us to shift the perception of innovation from a risk to an advantage, and helped reframe the procurement dialogue around outcomes, not just inputs
How do you approach strategic planning and decision-making in your organization?
Our approach to strategic planning is rooted in both industry foresight and operational pragmatism. We apply a dual-lens model—one that looks ahead to long-term shifts in the regulatory and technological ecosystem, such as AI Into Services, Energy Transition, NIS2 directives, SEMD requirements and more, while the other stays anchored in the immediate needs and pain points of our clients. This balance helps us remain responsive today while staying relevant tomorrow.
We believe that strategy is a marathon run one step at a time—so we emphasise nimble decision-making, short planning sprints, and clear metrics of progress. In highly regulated sectors like utilities, where multi-year programmes are common, it’s the organisations that can pivot decisively within a larger strategic arc that ultimately succeed.
To enable this, we’ve developed Business Consumption Framework (BCF)—an internal methodology that connects strategic priorities to operational execution. It allows us to map events and breaches to their broader organisational impact, and align them with standards practices. This ensures that every operational decision is traceable to a strategic goal.
Decision-making is inherently collaborative. We actively co-create strategy with our partners and customers, using design thinking workshops, rapid prototyping, and feedback loops to validate assumptions. This allows us to de-risk big decisions and ensure that our innovation roadmap aligns with real-world readiness and regulatory timelines.
Ultimately, our strategy is not written in stone—it’s adaptive by design, powered by insight, industry alignment, and a clear-eyed focus on delivering outcomes that matter.
What is your approach to leadership and fostering a positive company culture?
For me, leadership is fundamentally about leading—and that can’t be done from behind. It’s about being present, visible, and accountable. Whether it’s navigating complexity, standing up for a vision, or making tough calls, I believe leaders must model the behaviours they expect from others. That’s why I follow a servant-leadership philosophy—my role is to set direction, remove barriers, and create clarity of purpose, so that every individual in the organisation can lead in their own space.
Culture, on the other hand, isn’t something written on walls—it’s something you practice every day. We’ve built a culture that is curious, courageous, and inclusive. We firmly believe that every individual has something different and valuable to bring to the table, and our job as leaders is to create the conditions where that contribution can shine. It’s not about fitting people into a mould; it’s about unlocking their unique potential.
To support this, we’ve invested in initiatives like Education and Innovation, which isn’t just tech incubator—it’s a talent multiplier. It offers skills where people can experiment, learn, fail safely, and grow. We foster radical transparency, continuous learning, and real-time feedback so that people feel heard and empowered.
We also embrace a “lead from where you are” mindset. Leadership is not restricted to hierarchy—it’s about initiative, influence, and impact. That’s why we structure our teams to be cross-functional, outcome-driven, and self-directed, encouraging ownership at every level.
At its core, a positive culture is one where people feel trusted, supported, and inspired to do their best work—and that’s what we aim to deliver every day.
How do you ensure your business remains adaptable and responsive to market changes?
Adaptability isn’t just a principle for us—it’s a core design feature of how we operate. In fast-evolving and highly regulated industries like utilities, responsiveness to market shifts—be they technological, regulatory, or environmental—is not optional, it’s existential. That’s why we’ve built flexibility into every layer of our business.
First, our operating model is modular by design. This allows us to rapidly configure and reconfigure our solutions based on client needs, market dynamics, or regulatory changes. Whether we’re delivering an AI-led compliance engine or a digital twin for infrastructure modelling, our modular architecture ensures scalability without being locked into rigid structures.
Second, we invest heavily in scenario planning and foresight. By tracking upcoming regulatory frameworks such as MHHS, NIS2, and SEMD, we don’t just respond to change—we anticipate it. Our advisory and product teams actively map future scenarios and test how our solutions hold up across multiple outcomes. This gives us the agility to pivot quickly while others are still adjusting their strategies.
We also maintain a lean and empowered organizational structure that supports rapid decision-making. There’s minimal red tape and a high degree of autonomy, so we can respond to new opportunities or challenges without losing momentum. This is particularly important when navigating complex stakeholder landscapes, where timing and clarity make the difference between a missed opportunity and a market breakthrough.
Furthermore, we actively engage in ecosystem partnerships—with technology providers, audit firms, universities, and regulators—so we stay embedded in the pulse of the industry. These collaborations give us insight, credibility, and speed when entering new problem spaces.
Ultimately, our ability to remain adaptable comes from being close to the ground but always scanning the horizon—staying deeply connected to our clients’ realities while continuously evolving with the market.
Can you discuss a recent innovation or project that has been particularly successful for your company?
We’ve been fortunate to drive several transformative initiatives recently, but three in particular stand out—each solving a different but deeply entrenched challenge in the utilities sector. These projects reflect our approach to innovation with intent: combining regulatory awareness, AI-driven design, and ecosystem collaboration to deliver impact that is both measurable and meaningful.
The first is our Compliance Accountability Solution, developed in response to the Water Special Measures Bill, which proposed criminal liability for CEOs of water companies in the UK. Recognising the urgency and gravity of this legislative shift, we built a workflow-driven compliance platform powered by AI and legal logic. This solution ensures that every regulatory decision—particularly those related to Ofwat’s Outcome Delivery Incentives (ODIs)—is digitally traceable, delegated, and signed off by the responsible individuals within the organisation or its supply chain. It empowers CEOs to maintain accountability while safely delegating execution, providing both transparency and protection. The solution is now being taken to market through a tri-party partnership model involving a major audit firm, a systems integrator, and EKAM-AI as the domain and design authority.
Beyond compliance, we’ve been advancing two cornerstone innovations: the Business Consumption Framework (BCF) and the Utility Stakeholder Model (USM).
The BCF reimagines how utilities respond to events like leaks, pollution, outages, and cyber alerts. Traditionally, such events are handled in silos across different departments, leading to fragmented response and misaligned accountability. The BCF introduces a unified framework—aligned to standards that connects event data with organisational context, enabling more intelligent, real-time response. It’s designed with a three-layer implementation, This model not only improves incident handling but also supports long-term transformation by codifying resilience into operating models.
Meanwhile, the Utility Stakeholder Model (USM) is reshaping how customer data and engagement are understood. Utilities have historically focused only on bill-payers, but today, the customer ecosystem includes regulators, environmental groups, community organisations, visitors, and even future generations. The USM proposes a Customer 2.0 architecture, allowing utility companies to model this broader range of stakeholders in their enterprise systems, especially in SAP and Oracle landscapes. This enables more equitable decision-making, proactive engagement, and smarter policy implementation.
All three innovations—Compliance Accountability, BCF, and USM—were developed not in isolation, but through collaborative design, working closely with clients, academics, and ecosystem partners. They represent our belief that innovation must be grounded in context, shaped by domain expertise, and executed with urgency and agility.
These projects also reflect a broader trend I often write about in my LinkedIn newsletter: the shift from reactive digital projects to purpose-led transformation strategies, where compliance, sustainability, and customer value are seen not as constraints, but as catalysts for innovation.
What are your long-term goals for your business, and how are you working towards achieving them?
Our long-term vision is to continue to position as a strategic enabler of transformation across regulated industries—beginning with utilities, where we’ve built deep domain credibility, and progressively expanding into sectors such as pharmaceuticals, transport, and smart infrastructure ecosystems.
We’re not just solving for technology adoption—we’re helping organisations reframe their operating models in response to shifting regulatory expectations, stakeholder demands, and environmental realities. Our goal is to support senior leaders and boards in moving from compliance-driven change to purpose-led transformation, where regulation, sustainability, and customer impact become levers for innovation rather than barriers to progress.
To achieve this, we are focused on four strategic pillars:
- Scalable Solution Architectures – We are building modular, domain-led digital solutions that are designed for reuse, interoperability, and rapid deployment. Whether it’s asset management, compliance automation, or stakeholder engagement models like USM, our platforms are built to scale across organisations and geographies.
- Ecosystem and Academic Collaboration – We actively invest in partnerships with leading academic institutions and industry bodies to shape the next generation of utility and infrastructure innovation. These collaborations help us remain at the forefront of research, influence policy thinking, and build credibility with regulators and senior stakeholders. Our ongoing engagements with industry forums is a critical enabler here—allowing us to validate and scale innovation that is both technically sound and nationally relevant.
- International Market Development – As part of our growth strategy, we are actively progressing conversations in the Middle East, where there is a strong appetite for sustainable infrastructure, digital utility transformation, and smart city development. These discussions represent a strategic opportunity to bring our domain expertise and innovation frameworks into high-growth markets, tailored to local regulatory and environmental contexts.
- Intellectual Capital and Digital Assets – We’re embedding knowledge into reusable digital frameworks such as the Business Consumption Framework (BCF), enabling organisations to accelerate transformation without starting from zero. These assets are designed to be sector-agnostic and adaptable to complex governance environments.
Ultimately, our ambition is to support not just individual clients, but to raise the maturity of transformation across the entire sector—by offering new models, new mindsets, and actionable strategies that connect long-term resilience with immediate operational relevance.
As we scale, we remain committed to being more than a vendor—we aim to be a trusted thinking partner to CXOs and transformation leaders navigating some of the most complex shifts of our time.
What advice would you give to emerging entrepreneurs in your industry?
In industries like utilities, infrastructure, and other regulated sectors, entrepreneurship isn’t about moving fast and breaking things—it’s about moving purposefully and building things that last.
My advice to emerging entrepreneurs is: start with purpose, stay with context, and scale with partnerships.
Too many new ventures focus on chasing the latest technology trend—AI, blockchain, digital twins—without truly understanding the problem they’re trying to solve or the environment they’re working in. These sectors don’t respond to hype; they respond to clarity, credibility, and value. Spend time deeply understanding the operational, regulatory, and cultural fabric of your customer’s world. Know what’s at stake when a wastewater site fails, or why a compliance report gets escalated. When you build with that level of insight, your innovation becomes not just relevant—it becomes indispensable.
Second, recognise that you can’t—and shouldn’t—build the future alone. Every meaningful innovation I’ve been part of—whether it’s the Business Consumption Framework (BCF), the Utility Stakeholder Model (USM), or our Compliance Accountability Solution—has been the result of deep collaboration across ecosystems. That includes partnerships with academic institutions, audit firms, system integrators, and forward-thinking regulators. Innovation today is less about proprietary IP and more about shared frameworks, mutual accountability, and collaborative delivery.
Third, don’t underestimate the importance of systems thinking. It’s not just about building a great product—it’s about fitting it into the broader landscape of procurement models, data governance, workforce capability, and policy priorities. My engagements with industry forums and stakeholders across multiple regions have reinforced this point— enterprises are not just looking for tech, they’re looking for solutions that work in their world.
Lastly, I’ll say this: entrepreneurship in this space is a long game. It requires resilience, adaptability, and conviction. You’ll often be ahead of the curve, and that can feel frustrating. But if you keep aligning your work to real-world problems, stay open to collaboration, and remain grounded in integrity—you’ll not only build a business, you’ll shape an industry.
“Don’t chase the future. Understand the present well enough to build it.”
