I imagine, build and ship software products.
Founder-operator / Head of Product & Technology. Three skills rarely found in one operator: the product instinct to invent it, the commercial instinct to make it pay, the technical depth to build it - or lead the team that does.
Proof, in numbers.
Every venture funded or trained the next: a games studio, a consultancy, a healthcare platform, and now a product built end to end with AI. This is the scorecard.
Three skills. One operator.
Most product leaders own one of these. Some own two. The rare and useful thing is owning all three at once - it's what carries an idea from a blank page to a launched, revenue-generating product.
I invent products, not just deliver them.
- Reimagined a whole genre with Commando Jack - #1 in 36 countries, 10M+ plays.
- Originated Immersive Medical, a VR telemedicine platform, from a blank page to a provisional NHS pilot.
- Conceived and shipped a subscription productivity app end to end (launching 2026).
- Led product & delivery on the McDonald's Happy Meal app across ~40 markets.
A founder's instinct for the numbers.
- Found ~£2m in annual savings in under three months at McDonald's (R/GA) - they offered me a permanent role heading the function.
- £450k+ raised; secured the EA Games / Chillingo publishing partnership.
- Grew a consultancy to £1,500+ a day in billing at premium day rates - while paying developers market rates.
- Ran a company 5+ years without taking a salary, own capital in - staying power, not a chaser of shiny objects.
- Cut development cost 40% on a JP Morgan engagement.
I can build it - or build and lead the team that does.
- Hands-on across C#/.NET, Azure, AI/data, Python, SQL; learned Kotlin to ship my latest product.
- Built VR platforms, an enterprise 3D-visualisation core, and large-scale simulations.
- Led engineering and distributed teams - the NEOM turnaround, oversight of a ~30-person development partner at R/GA, a staffed consultancy.
- Uses depth for sound build-vs-buy calls and to lead from what's true, not the abstract.
The team is a function of the problem: solo when it's small and personal; a built-and-led team when it isn't - from one pair of hands to operations of hundreds.
Twenty years, in order.
Every venture funded or trained the next. Open any event for the detail - one at a time, like a dossier.
Product: founding a games studio
2005 – 20152005Into the games industry+
Straight in with the big studios - Crytek and EA Games - working on major titles including Battlefield, Burnout, Harry Potter and Crysis 2.
2009Founded Colossal Games+
Started the studio in my mid-twenties; grew it to a ~15-person core team with publishing and platform relationships at Apple, Microsoft and Google. Own capital in, taking no salary for five of its seven years.
2010Crysis 2: "The Wall" trailer+
Technical lead at Maverick Media, working with Crytek and EA Games.
2012Commando Jack launches with EA Games / Chillingo+
Identified EA as the right publisher, built the prototype and pitched directly. The game reimagined its genre, and the world map lit up.
2012 – 15The studio gets noticed+
Selected for EA's Summer Showcase from 150+ titles, presented at Millbank Tower alongside Medal of Honor and Crysis. Won Microsoft's "Beautiful Game" award (top 10 of 150+ studios). Raised £450k+ at a £1.25m valuation, and grew revenue 10× by moving from premium to freemium. A new Commando Jack concept was assessed at NaturalMotion (VP level) as having multi-million revenue potential. They offered me a product role; I stayed founder.
Service: scaling an enterprise consultancy
2016 – 20232016Founded HAUD / Protected Void+
Grew a freelance practice into a staffed consultancy for JP Morgan, HP, IBM, McDonald's and EE. Charged £500–550 a day per consultant against a ~£300 market norm while paying developers market rates.
2017McDonald's Happy Meal app · R/GA+
Ran the global app across ~40 markets, 42 languages and 52 licensed properties. By getting close to the commercials, found roughly £2m in annual savings inside a three-month contract; R/GA answered with the offer of a permanent role heading the function.
2021NEOM (The Line): digital-twin turnaround+
Technical Product Owner on a B2B digital-twin platform for the giga-project. Inherited an overdue programme, got delivery back on track, and presented recommendations to the CEO and board.
2016 – 23The consultancy at its peak+
At its peak the business billed £1,500+ a day and had become passive income: staff delivered the contracts while my involvement was down to about four hours a month - which made my time worth roughly £1,000 an hour - freeing both me and the capital to relaunch Commando Jack as Respawn.
Selected builds: Cancer Research UK VR (RHS Bronze Medal) · JP Morgan / Contex-City (development cost cut 40%) · National Nuclear Labs robotics simulation · EE 5G London launch · IBM Watson.
Product, again: self-funded ventures
2021 – now2021Commando Jack Respawn: a self-funded relaunch+
Funded by the consultancy's profits, I rebuilt Commando Jack from the ground up for a Steam-only PC launch, and built the whole operation around it: a launch-platform website, a creators programme, a beta-testing forum, direct sales with integrated payments, a TikTok channel. When the company's other investors chose not to share the next phase of costs, I wound it down rather than carry it alone. The first half of a lesson: I didn't want investors again.
2022Immersive Medical, funded by the consultancy's profits+
A VR telemedicine platform, funded like Respawn by the consultancy's profits: virtual appointments, a virtual hospital, clinician-monitored physiotherapy at home. Assembled a founding team including a consultant physician and, as finance director, the former head of Citibank Futures Sweden; reached a provisionally agreed NHS physiotherapy pilot before the sponsor moved on. The second half of the lesson: depending on any single outside party can stall the work just the same.
2022 – nowGoing all in on the craft+
Twice in a row, what stopped a venture wasn't the product; it was depending on someone else. My answer was to remove the dependencies: around 30 hours a week of study for three years on top of a 40-hour week, finishing top of my cohorts - while prototyping VR for Meta and building forecasting and profit optimisation at ImpactXP.ai for Coca-Cola, Mars, Unilever and L'Oréal.
2024 – 25An automated AI marketing pipeline+
Built alongside the app: n8n agentic workflows calling ChatGPT, Gemini Deep Research, ElevenLabs and Leonardo AI, generating videos in batches of ten for an Instagram channel built to bring people to the app. Parked to focus on the product; automated customer acquisition resumes after launch.
2024 – 26Productivity app: the live scoreboard starts here+
A subscription product built end to end, solo and unfunded, with AI-assisted delivery: Claude Code writes the production code; I own the architecture, the decisions and the review. Everything above is a trophy; this is the first entry designed to update while you watch.
The through-line: the games studio proved I could make products people love; the consultancy proved I could make a business pay; its profits funded a Commando Jack rebuild and then the healthcare venture; and everything since has been deliberate training for shipping products single-handed with AI. Each chapter bankrolled or trained the next.
"When I tallied the total hours people had spent inside the game, it came to more than two and a half of my own lifespans. I've given more back to the world than I've taken from it in my entire life."
- from the story, on Commando JackSome of the things I've shipped.
Products are the proof. Concepts are easy; getting something into the hands of millions of people and seeing what they actually do with it - that's the work.
From the consultancy years
High-profile builds led or delivered through a consultancy I built and staffed - spanning XR, simulation, AR, live events, AI and mobile. Many more under NDA.
"Sometime after launch, a cousin called me from a beach in Spain to say he'd just walked past someone sitting on the sand playing Commando Jack. Genuine joy."
- from the storyDon't take my word for it.
What the press wrote, and - louder than any quote - what companies did after working with me or with what I built.
What twenty years of building actually taught me.
These aren't borrowed from books. They're what I've come to believe, the hard way, from products that worked and products that didn't.
01Software is the rare product that doesn't get more expensive to sell.
Physical products tax you with manufacturing every time you transact. Software duplicates on sale. This single property changes what's possible - for founders, for impact, for the kind of legacy a working life can leave.
02The screenshot test.
Take a few screenshots of the current version of a product next to the previous one. If a customer can't tell the difference, it isn't a new product - it's an update. Real innovation has to be visible at the level of the user's actual experience.
03Understand the build, and you build better software.
You don't have to write every line. But a leader who understands how the thing is actually made decides better - what something truly costs, how it scales, whether you're asking for a day's work or a quarter's. Technical depth means never having to lead in the abstract.
04Build what you need, ship lean, listen carefully.
The fastest validation is often to build a product you would genuinely use, keep the cost low, ship it, and study how the market responds. Provided you listen, no launched product is wasted - each one sharpens the rarest skill there is: turning ideas into products.
05Hierarchy of need beats novelty.
I moved from games to productivity because people need productivity more often than they need entertainment. The market for "I need this today" is more durable than the market for "I want this today".
06Hone your unfair advantage. Don't borrow other people's.
Business books often describe what worked for one founder in one set of circumstances. Pick what fits the way you actually work.
07Size the team to the problem, not the ego.
A small, personal problem I'll ship solo and fast. A large one I won't touch without the right team around it - the bigger the challenge, the bigger the team and the bigger the risk, and those three move together.
08Conviction is a multi-year sport.
A real product takes years to find its market and longer to sustain. I ran a company for more than five years drawing no salary - my own money in - because I believed in what we were building. That isn't restlessness; it's knowing where time is best spent, then staying the course.
What I'm taking conversations about.
Executive leadership
Founder-Operator / Head of Product & Technology at founder-led businesses or scale-ups - owning product strategy, delivery and go-to-market, with oversight of technology.
Entrepreneurial leadership
EiR / corporate innovation - standing up a net-new product or division inside a well-backed company. FiR with a venture studio or VC: originating, building and proving a company from zero.
Advisory & flexible
Fractional CTO/CPO, part-time leadership, contract engagements, board and advisory positions - lighter commitments, same depth.
The common thread: I work best close to the commercials - the revenue, the deals, the budgets, the numbers that tell you whether the product is actually working. A role that walls product off from the P&L tends to under-use what I bring.
Fixed scopes. Clear entry points.
Defined work with a defined way in - and where a fee leads to a build, it credits in full against the build.
Venture Readiness Audit
~£3,000 fixed fee
comparable scoping sprints · credits in full against the build
MVP scoping, feasibility and cost, before you spend. The report stands alone and goes to any builder.
Read the full offer →AI Code Audit & Rescue
From ~£495
rapid triage first · credits in full against the work
From AI prototype to production - triage of what you have, then a plan to make it shippable.
Read the full offer →Technical Due Diligence
From ~£10,000
deal value under £1m · quoted per deal
Investor-side, before the money moves. What the team says vs what the code says.
Read the full offer →Fractional CTO
£800–£2,000/day
retainers commonly £3,000–£7,000/mo · quoted per scope
Part-time technology leadership - the senior half of a CTO without the full-time hire.
Read the full offer →Technical Co-Founder
Cash + equity
paid audit first · then build for a fee, or cash + equity
Hire one, or partner with one. Product built, decisions owned, skin in the game.
Read the full offer →Corporate Venture Building
Quoted per venture
one operator vs a studio's $1.4–2.5m/yr · £800–£2,000/day
New products and divisions for established companies - one operator instead of a studio.
Read the full offer →What would your app cost to build?
A rough range in ten seconds - UK senior day rates against typical build-day counts. The Venture Readiness Audit turns this into a real, scoped number.
UK senior day rates of £800–£2,000 against typical build-day counts for your selection. This is not a quote.
For comparison: the Venture Readiness Audit turns this range into a real, scoped number - a fixed fee in the region of the ~£3,000 that independent scoping sprints cost, credited in full if I build it.