<p dir="ltr">Any founder knows that building an AI model is only the beginning. The real test is turning technical innovation into a usable product that scales.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Across the Faces of AI series, founders shared the toughest parts of that journey - from market readiness and regulation to maintaining alignment as their teams and products grow. Their stories show that success depends as much on people and process as it does on the model itself.</p>
<p dir="ltr">&nbsp;</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">1. From Proof of Concept to Product</h3>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Katya Lait, nettle</h3>
<p dir="ltr">Scalability isn't top of mind yet. We&rsquo;re still in our first year, building bespoke versions of nettle for clients. Year Two is when we&rsquo;ll step back, consider the ecosystem of solutions we&rsquo;ve built, and focus on scalability.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Some obvious steps we&rsquo;re taking now are distributing requests across specialised agents, reducing unnecessary API calls, and building generic components we&rsquo;ll reuse across clients. As much as we can, we cache everything and have the system learn from itself - a crucial feature for our mission to close the knowledge gap in risk engineering.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Beyond data sovereignty and open-source innovation, the biggest challenge has been translation. We&rsquo;re working in a country where English isn&rsquo;t spoken, so our AI reasons in English but delivers results in the user&rsquo;s language. It&rsquo;s complex, but it means we can support virtually any market moving forward.</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">&nbsp;</h3>
<h3 dir="ltr">George Parry &amp; Charles Cross, Emma AI</h3>
<p dir="ltr">George: Our hardest technical challenge was building a system where any user can ask any question, about any part of their data, at any time, and get the right output. Interoperability in health and social care was another major hurdle. Too many companies treat patient data as their moat - even though it belongs to the user. We&rsquo;ve worked to make Emma the opposite: an open platform anyone can connect to and from.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Charles: Another challenge has been bridging the gap between initial excitement around AI and real-world impact. In a regulated, human-centred sector like care, plug-and-play tools don&rsquo;t work. Our partnership model means working closely with providers, iterating fast, and being open to tough conversations.</p>
<p dir="ltr">&nbsp;</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Eric Marcuson, ClinBI</h3>
<p dir="ltr">For most founders, one of the biggest challenges is figuring out what customers actually want. Product&ndash;market fit isn&rsquo;t something you check off and move on from. It evolves - as channels, customer value, and priorities shift.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The other big challenge is people. Whether it&rsquo;s your team or your customers, understanding how people think, communicate, and collaborate is critical. That means always talking to the customer and those around them.</p>
<p><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Patrick Sharpe, Artificial Societies</h3>
<p dir="ltr">What we&rsquo;re building is unique - there aren&rsquo;t many prosumer tools that let people run real experiments. One of the biggest challenges has been making that experience accessible without dumbing it down.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Early on, there&rsquo;s a temptation to overbuild. But we&rsquo;ve had to practise real restraint. Our mantra is that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.</p>
<p><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">2. Bridging the Gap Between Tech and Adoption</h3>
<p><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Eduardo Mandela, Maihem</h3>
<p dir="ltr">The biggest challenge (and opportunity) is the gap between cutting-edge AI and real-world adoption. Most companies don&rsquo;t have the talent, understanding, or confidence to use these tools effectively.</p>
<p dir="ltr">I call this the &lsquo;chasm of adoption&rsquo;. That&rsquo;s where we come in - bridging the gap through education, helping people understand how AI systems work and how to use them safely and effectively.</p>
<p><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">George Hancock &amp; Eric Topham, Octaipipe</h3>
<p dir="ltr">George: We&rsquo;ve always been slightly ahead - building solutions 18 months before the market&rsquo;s really ready for them. The challenge isn&rsquo;t whether AI can help; it&rsquo;s whether the market recognises the problem it&rsquo;s solving right now.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Eric: 99% of people talking about AI don&rsquo;t really know what they&rsquo;re talking about. That makes scaling difficult because most organisations don&rsquo;t know what they&rsquo;re buying or how to be ready for it. You can build a brilliant churn prediction model, but if the business doesn&rsquo;t know what to do with that prediction, it&rsquo;s useless.</p>
<p><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Roshan Tamil Sellvan, AdvisoryAI</h3>
<p dir="ltr">It&rsquo;s important to set clear ethical boundaries, especially in finance. We&rsquo;ve built safeguards into our model architecture - training the AI to filter inappropriate language and analyse outputs against FCA frameworks before deployment. Multiple specialised models validate accuracy and compliance at each step. If a report doesn&rsquo;t meet quality thresholds, the system prompts a rewrite.</p>
<p dir="ltr">We started out building an assistant, but realised we&rsquo;d created a powerful report-writing tool. That adaptability has opened new markets - from finance to law. We&rsquo;re now expanding into the US, Australia, and Canada, each with its own regulations and nuances, but that&rsquo;s part of the challenge we&rsquo;re tackling as we grow.</p>
<p><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">3. Scaling Without Losing What Works</h3>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Jonathan Low, Scope</h3>
<p dir="ltr">We've taken a modular approach to development because most inspection workflows are unique. As we scale, the challenge is keeping the data layer consistent so we can onboard customers faster and make it easier for them to adjust their reports and workflows.</p>
<p dir="ltr">As a small team, we've stayed very customer-focused. The goal is to keep that mindset - ensuring everyone on the team maintains the same level of customer involvement as we grow.</p>
<p><strong>&nbsp;</strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Scott Wilson, Covecta</h3>
<p dir="ltr">Our biggest challenge - and it&rsquo;s ongoing - is scaling while maintaining impact and quality. As we work with more customers, the volume and complexity of product requirements increase.</p>
<p dir="ltr">We&rsquo;re focused on prioritising the features that deliver the greatest value to users and building an engineering engine that consistently ships high-quality AI capabilities at scale.</p>
<p dir="ltr">&nbsp;</p>
<hr>
<p dir="ltr">&nbsp;</p>
<p dir="ltr">Once the model works, the real work begins.&nbsp;</p>
<p dir="ltr">Productising AI means navigating regulation, readiness, and human behaviour - all while proving value at scale. These founders show that lasting impact comes not just from technical excellence, but also from from clarity, adaptability, and a focus on real-world use.</p>
<p data-start="653" data-end="727"><strong>Generative connects top AI talent with the startups defining the future.</strong></p>
<p data-start="734" data-end="882"><a href="https://myfractional.ai/insider-channel/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><strong data-start="734" data-end="762">Join our insider network</strong> to get first access to opportunities, stories, and trends from across the AI sector.</a></p>

Any founder knows that building an AI model is only the beginning. The real test is turning technical innovation into a usable product that scales.

You’ve Built the Model. Now What? The Hardest Part of Productising AI

<p dir="ltr">When your success hinges on how your message lands, why wait until after you&rsquo;ve launched to find out how it performs?&nbsp;</p>
<p dir="ltr">That&rsquo;s the question driving Artificial Societies, a startup using AI simulations to help founders, marketers, and decision-makers test how their content will resonate before it goes live.</p>
<p dir="ltr">In this edition of Faces of AI, we speak to Patrick Sharpe, co-founder and Chief Product Officer, about why behavioural science was the perfect launchpad, what makes their platform tick under the hood, and how AI is turning once-exclusive research tools into something far more accessible (and powerful) for everyday creators.</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">What specific problem is Artificial Societies solving, and why does it matter?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">We&rsquo;re solving a core problem: people don&rsquo;t know how their messages or ideas will land until they&rsquo;re already out in the world.</p>
<p dir="ltr">That matters because it&rsquo;s a high-stakes environment to get things wrong, especially when you're launching something new. We give people the confidence to take bigger bets by showing them how their communications are likely to be received before they go live.</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">What's the origin story behind the company?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">There are two of us behind Artificial Societies &ndash; myself and my co-founder, James. We&rsquo;re both behavioural scientists by background. I came from a behavioural economics and consulting path, where I was helping businesses run experiments to improve things like retention and conversion. The main problem there is that experiments tend to be slow, expensive, and sometimes impossible to run.</p>
<p dir="ltr">James came from a more theoretical background &ndash; network science and simulations. When he showed me what&rsquo;s possible by connecting AI agents to mimic real people, it clicked. This could be a faster, more scalable way to test ideas before going live.</p>
<p dir="ltr">We&rsquo;d known each other for a while, but in September last year, we started building. I immediately saw the product potential and how powerful this could be for decision-makers. That&rsquo;s where it all began.<strong><br></strong></p>
<p dir="ltr"><img src="https://cdn.sourceflow.co.uk/__gallery/dee23eaa-1737-4c46-994b-15103a2b7f64" alt="" width="600" height="400"></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">There is a lot of uncertainty, even fear, in the wider population when it comes to AI. What are some of the most common myths or misconceptions that you hear?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">A big one is the fear that AI is replacing people or taking jobs. But what we&rsquo;re doing with Artificial Societies is actually expanding access, especially in market research.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Traditionally, running a survey with a few thousand people could cost $10,000 or more. That&rsquo;s only accessible to organisations with big budgets and long timelines. But everyone benefits from better audience understanding and more confident decision-making.</p>
<p dir="ltr">By using simulations, we lower the barrier to entry. Now, even something as simple as a LinkedIn post can be tested before going live. What used to be expensive and slow is now fast, affordable, and scalable. In that sense, we&rsquo;re aiming to be the ChatGPT of simulations by bringing cutting-edge tools to a much wider audience.</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">For you and the team at Artificial Societies, how does AI safety show up in your day to day?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">AI safety shows up in two big ways for us: data use and moderation.</p>
<p dir="ltr">First, we only use publicly available data: things people have freely posted online. For example, if this interview ends up on the internet, that&rsquo;s the kind of content we&rsquo;d use to build a persona of me. We don&rsquo;t collect private or sensitive information, and we&rsquo;re strict about what goes in.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Second, we&rsquo;ve put clear guardrails in place around how simulations can be used. You can create audiences like &ldquo;US professionals,&rdquo; but if someone tries to simulate an inappropriate or harmful group, it&rsquo;s automatically blocked.</p>
<p dir="ltr">What&rsquo;s powerful is that AI also helps us enforce these standards. Rather than relying on rigid rule sets or thousands of human moderators, our system uses AI to assess whether audience requests are appropriate. That allows us to moderate at scale &ndash; safely and responsibly.</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">What is the most exciting technical challenge that you've overcome so far?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">As Chief Product Officer, my focus is on how users interact with the product&hellip; what features they need, how intuitive it feels, and how we make something complex feel simple.</p>
<p dir="ltr">What we&rsquo;re building is pretty unique. There aren&rsquo;t many prosumer tools out there that let people run real experiments. So one of the biggest technical challenges has been making that experience accessible, without dumbing it down.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Early on, like most startups, there&rsquo;s a temptation to overbuild. But we&rsquo;ve had to practise real restraint. Our mantra is that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.</p>
<p dir="ltr">From the user&rsquo;s perspective, it&rsquo;s straightforward: you describe who you want to simulate, and we do the rest. Behind the scenes, though, it&rsquo;s deeply complex. That one description gets enriched with AI, matched against a database of half a million personas, and turned into a functioning simulated society.</p>
<p dir="ltr">It's like an iceberg &ndash; the interface looks clean and minimal, but there's a huge technical structure beneath the surface. Making that invisible complexity feel natural to the user has been a major (and rewarding) challenge.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><img src="https://cdn.sourceflow.co.uk/__gallery/ce7b95a7-6fbe-4ac9-8bdd-9a4f741eac26" alt="" width="600" height="400"></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">How people are using the product right now? What&rsquo;s the use case?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">One of the best current use cases for our product is in marketing. If you have a specific target audience and content like LinkedIn posts, emails, or blogs, our tool lets you simulate how that content will land before you launch it.</p>
<p dir="ltr">You can create detailed audiences &ndash; even hard-to-reach groups like CEOs, who rarely respond to traditional surveys. With simulations, you can effectively &ldquo;survey&rdquo; these groups and see their likely reactions.</p>
<p dir="ltr">It&rsquo;s ideal for content creators, marketers, founders&hellip; anyone with a message they want to resonate with the right people. We&rsquo;re excited to be launching new features soon, and we hope more people will give it a try!</p>
<h3 dir="ltr">In terms of AI trends, what are you finding genuinely exciting at the moment?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">What excites me most is how AI is lowering the barrier to entry for creative, technical work. Tools like Lovable and Cursor are great examples. You used to need years of engineering experience to build software or run data analysis. Now, with the right mindset and a bit of creativity, you can do those things in minutes.</p>
<p dir="ltr">It&rsquo;s not about replacing skills, but supercharging people who are already capable and curious. That&rsquo;s incredibly powerful.</p>
<p dir="ltr">I&rsquo;m also really interested in where UI is heading. Many products are becoming more complex under the hood, but with AI agents acting on your behalf, the user experience can stay simple and conversational. You won&rsquo;t need to learn a new system each time. You&rsquo;ll just tell the AI what you want to do, and it&rsquo;ll handle the complexity. That shift is going to make once-specialised skills feel native and intuitive, which is really exciting.</p>
<p dir="ltr"><img src="https://cdn.sourceflow.co.uk/__gallery/632e6ea7-cd3c-4e61-b5e8-dc2ab61d7437" alt="" width="600" height="530"></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">Outside of work, how do you decompress?&nbsp;</h3>
<p dir="ltr">It&rsquo;s especially important for us to find balance, since James and I live and work in the same space &ndash; our flat is also our office. My commute is three metres down the hall, which is great for productivity, but it makes setting boundaries even more crucial.</p>
<p dir="ltr">For me, routines are everything. I&rsquo;ve made a rule that every morning before 9am is my time. No meetings. No work. Just some form of exercise. Whether it&rsquo;s a run, gym, yoga or stretching, I do it every single day. It&rsquo;s a non-negotiable.</p>
<p dir="ltr">That idea of setting defaults comes from behavioural science. It&rsquo;s much easier to follow through when you&rsquo;ve already decided in advance. It takes the mental load out of making the choice every day.</p>
<p dir="ltr">My girlfriend and I also have a weekly date-night rule. We take turns planning it and stick to it without fail. It&rsquo;s a simple way to protect time for each other outside of work.<strong><br></strong></p>
<h3 dir="ltr">If you weren't working on Artificial Societies, what other problems could you see yourself trying to solve with AI?</h3>
<p dir="ltr">Since starting the company, I&rsquo;ve got into the habit of journalling every night before bed. It helps me process the day and over time, it&rsquo;s become a way to track the whole journey.</p>
<p dir="ltr">The thing is, our memories &ndash;&nbsp;photos, journals, conversations &ndash; end up scattered across different places. One idea I&rsquo;d love to explore is an AI-powered memory bank. Something that could take all those daily reflections, photos, stories and turn them into a rich, narrative archive.</p>
<p dir="ltr">Imagine being able to talk to an AI at the end of each day, share what happened, have it prompt you, organise the moments, even pull in photos. Then, years down the line, you could ask it: what was it really like building that startup? And it would remember. Accurately, and in detail.</p>
<p dir="ltr">We forget so many of the little stories that make up a life. I&rsquo;d love to help people capture and tell them better.</p>
<p><img src="https://cdn.sourceflow.co.uk/__gallery/1993f6aa-ebed-4306-a563-2ddf177443ce" alt="" width="600" height="322"></p>
<p id="ember704" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph"><strong>Patrick and Artificial Societies were recently featured in our 'Faces of AI 2025' report, which is available to </strong><a class="TAkGWjHhmVmkmMDJGaNOrxvCVcOPkgho " tabindex="0" href="https://www.generativegroup.ai/reports/faces-of-ai-2025/?utm_source=linkedin&amp;utm_medium=social" target="_self" data-test-app-aware-link=""><strong>download for free now</strong></a><strong>.</strong></p>
<p id="ember705" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph"><strong>At Generative, we work with AI-driven startups to scale innovation, refine strategy, and accelerate growth. If you're building in AI and looking for the right talent to take your company to the next level, </strong><a class="TAkGWjHhmVmkmMDJGaNOrxvCVcOPkgho " tabindex="0" href="https://www.generativegroup.ai/contact-us/" target="_self" data-test-app-aware-link=""><strong>let's talk.</strong></a></p>

When your success hinges on how your message lands, why wait until after you’ve launched to find out how it performs?  That’s the question driving Artificial Societies, a startup using AI simulations to help founders, marketers, and decision-makers test how their content will resonate before it goes live.

Meet “The ChatGPT of Simulations” – How Artificial Societies Is Democratizing Market Testing

<h2 id="ember3781" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-3">Scott Wilson, Founder of Covecta, isn&rsquo;t here to hype AI. He&rsquo;s here to make it work.</h2>
<p id="ember3782" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">With a mission to unlock scalable growth in one of the world&rsquo;s most complex industries, <a class="EaWzLdfjwgloMRCqeXHrsnLLcqdpxKtzA " tabindex="0" href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/covecta/" data-test-app-aware-link="">Covecta</a> is building autonomous AI agents tailored for financial services.</p>
<p id="ember3783" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">In this conversation, Scott shares what it really takes to scale AI at the enterprise level, why human oversight is evolving &ndash; and why now&rsquo;s the time to join the team shaping the agentic layer of the future.</p>
<h2>What specific problem is your startup solving and why does it matter right now more than ever?</h2>
<p id="ember3785" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We&rsquo;re solving a widespread productivity and growth challenge in financial services.</p>
<p id="ember3786" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">In many Western economies, productivity has stagnated &ndash; largely because organisations haven&rsquo;t modernised their tech infrastructure fast enough. Instead, they&rsquo;ve leaned on growing headcount, which only adds cost without addressing the underlying issues.</p>
<p id="ember3787" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Our AI agents are purpose-built for financial services. They help optimise operating models and redirect investment toward technology that enables scalable, sustainable growth.</p>
<p id="ember3788" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">And why now? Over the past three years, we&rsquo;ve seen rapid AI adoption. What started with ChatGPT&rsquo;s consumer-level impact has evolved into mature enterprise capabilities &ndash; both generative and agentic. Every organisation is now asking: how can we use AI to strengthen our competitive edge, accelerate growth, and operate more efficiently?</p>
<p class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph"><img src="https://cdn.sourceflow.co.uk/__gallery/122a8962-53c0-4af7-97e6-23b4abdacba3" alt="" width="600" height="412"></p>
<h2 id="ember3790" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">What's the origin story behind Covecta?</h2>
<p id="ember3791" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Covecta&rsquo;s founders have backgrounds in financial services and enterprise technology. We&rsquo;ve seen the challenges in this space firsthand and have worked together long enough to build the trust and understanding that&rsquo;s essential for starting a business.</p>
<p id="ember3792" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We believe the opportunity here is huge. And if we get it right, we&rsquo;ll unlock value not just for the industry, but for Covecta and our team as well.</p>
<h2 id="ember3794" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">There is a lot of uncertainty within the wider population when it comes to AI. What are some of the most common misconceptions you hear?</h2>
<p id="ember3795" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">There&rsquo;s a common fear that AI will replace humans, but history tells us otherwise.</p>
<p id="ember3796" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">The same fears surfaced with the industrial revolution and the internet. Each time, rather than eliminating human roles, technology shifted the nature of work. AI is no different. It&rsquo;s here to augment human capabilities, and not always replace them.</p>
<p id="ember3797" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Yes, we will see disruption across labour markets, but I don't think in the immediate term we are going to see mass lay-offs. What we&rsquo;ll see is a rebalancing: people moving into roles where they can be most effective, just as we have in every major technological shift.</p>
<p id="ember3798" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">The key to getting comfortable with AI is education &ndash; and that means investing time in the tools. Take an active interest in what AI is, what it can do, and how it applies to your world.</p>
<p id="ember3799" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">For organisations (especially the ones we work with) deploying AI appropriately means having a clear purpose. You need to know your objectives, identify the right use cases, and define how you&rsquo;ll measure success. Without that, adopting AI risks being directionless and ineffective.</p>
<h2 id="ember3800" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">For you and the team at Covecta, what does &lsquo;AI safety&rsquo; look like in practice?</h2>
<p id="ember3801" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Every AI vendor has a responsibility to ensure safe and secure deployment&hellip; from addressing social bias to protecting confidential data. That&rsquo;s non-negotiable.</p>
<p id="ember3802" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">But we also have to be mindful of how regulation impacts innovation. In the US, looser regulation and a large single market have created the conditions for huge tech companies to thrive. In contrast, Europe&rsquo;s more stringent approach (including the EU AI Act) comes with important safeguards, but also risks slowing growth and competitiveness.</p>
<p id="ember3803" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Ultimately, it&rsquo;s about striking the right balance. Strong governance and global responsibility are essential, but so is ensuring that regulation doesn&rsquo;t stifle progress.</p>
<h2 id="ember3804" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">What have you found to be the biggest challenge when bringing your product to market at scale?</h2>
<p id="ember3805" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Our biggest challenge &ndash; and it&rsquo;s an ongoing one &ndash; is scaling the product while maintaining impact and quality.</p>
<p id="ember3806" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">As we work with more customers and prospects, the volume and complexity of product requirements increase. A key focus will be to ensure we&rsquo;re prioritising the features that will deliver the greatest value to users.</p>
<p id="ember3807" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">At the same time, we&rsquo;re building an engineering engine that can consistently ship high-quality AI capabilities at scale. That&rsquo;s not a one-off effort. It requires continuous delivery, reliability, and a sharp focus on value. If we&rsquo;re not delivering meaningful impact, organisations will look elsewhere.</p>
<h2 id="ember3809" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">What kind of team are you building at Covecta, and what qualities or roles are you looking for as you grow?</h2>
<p id="ember3810" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We&rsquo;re a lean team by design. In the era of AI, you don&rsquo;t need bloated teams&hellip; you need people with the right expertise and mindset.</p>
<p id="ember3811" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We&rsquo;re looking for individuals with deep domain knowledge in either AI or financial services. If you have both, we <em>definitely</em> want to talk.</p>
<p id="ember3812" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We value people who can handle complexity and ambiguity, and who are motivated to help reshape the operating model of one of the world&rsquo;s largest industries. There&rsquo;s a new agentic layer emerging in the tech stack &ndash; and joining Covecta means being at the forefront of building that.</p>
<p id="ember3813" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We look for curiosity, drive, and people who take real professional pride in their work. Not just in front of the team, but behind the scenes too.</p>
<p id="ember3814" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">I&rsquo;m excited to share that we&rsquo;re now hiring across the business. Our immediate focus is growing the product and engineering team &ndash; from DevOps and full-stack developers to AI/ML engineers. We&rsquo;re also expanding commercially. But above all, we&rsquo;re focused on shipping high-quality products at scale, and we want people who are excited to help make that happen.</p>
<h2 id="ember3815" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">Tell us more about the AI engineering role in particular!</h2>
<p id="ember3816" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">As we grow, our core focus remains on building autonomous, specialised AI agents. Getting that right is critical to Covecta&rsquo;s success.</p>
<p id="ember3817" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We're developing a highly verticalised solution for financial services, which means understanding customer workflows deeply and delivering outputs with real relevance and context.</p>
<p id="ember3818" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Our AI engineering capability will play a vital role in accelerating product maturity and our long-term scale. We're looking for someone with hands-on experience in natural language processing, large language models, and ideally some MLOps exposure &ndash; you&rsquo;ll be designing, developing, and deploying high-quality AI/ML capabilities, all while ensuring ethical and responsible use, and establishing best practices within the organisation.</p>
<p id="ember3819" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">This is a fantastic chance to shape the agentic layer of a new tech stack in one of the world&rsquo;s most complex and valuable industries. We're looking for someone excited by hard problems, ideally with experience in a mature organisation, who wants to help build foundational AI infrastructure that defines our technical direction.</p>
<p id="ember3820" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We move quickly, and need someone who thrives in that kind of environment. Expect fast iterations, real ownership, and the opportunity to make a tangible impact from day one.</p>
<p class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph"><img src="https://cdn.sourceflow.co.uk/__gallery/7aa0ae56-5991-4131-b957-7d46314f0e33" alt="" width="600" height="369"></p>
<h2 id="ember3822" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">In terms of AI trends, what&rsquo;s genuinely exciting to you right now?</h2>
<p id="ember3823" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">What&rsquo;s exciting right now is that enterprise AI is moving beyond simple, everyday tasks and being applied to solve complex workflows, particularly in regulated industries like financial services.</p>
<p id="ember3824" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">One major shift we&rsquo;re seeing is a move from human-in-the-loop systems to fully agentic solutions. In this model, humans aren&rsquo;t completing tasks &ndash; they&rsquo;re overseeing a team of AI agents, stepping into a managerial or supervisory role. That&rsquo;s a significant change in how we think about work.</p>
<p id="ember3825" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">What stands out is how quickly financial services is moving in this direction. It&rsquo;s a sector many expected to be slow to adopt AI, but in reality, the scale and cost pressure are driving urgency. As one of the world&rsquo;s largest industries, the ripple effects of this transformation will be felt widely &ndash; and that&rsquo;s where it gets really interesting.</p>
<div class="reader-image-block reader-image-block--full-width">
<h2 id="ember3827" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">You're obviously very busy &ndash;&nbsp;how do you decompress?</h2>
<p id="ember3828" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">For me, decompression comes from working with people I genuinely enjoy spending time with. The hours are long and the work is intense, but being part of a founding team means we&rsquo;ve chosen to go on this journey together &ndash; and there&rsquo;s real trust, respect, and a shared sense of purpose. That makes a huge difference.</p>
<p id="ember3829" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">Outside of work, I&rsquo;ve got a toddler at home, which definitely helps keep things in perspective. He makes sure I stay present &ndash; whether I want to or not! And I&rsquo;m lucky to have a very understanding wife who plays a big part in making this all possible.</p>
<p id="ember3830" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">We&rsquo;re social beings at heart. This industry is built on relationships, and we try to enjoy the ride. Not just work hard, but have a good time doing it.</p>
<h2 id="ember3831" class="ember-view reader-text-block__heading-2">If you weren't working on Covecta, are there any other problems that you&rsquo;d want to solve with AI?</h2>
<p id="ember3832" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">One of the more frustrating parts of building Covecta isn&rsquo;t the product, it&rsquo;s everything around it. The admin, the red tape, the operational overhead of starting and running a business: payroll, pensions, VAT, banking, budgeting&hellip; the list goes on.</p>
<p id="ember3833" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">None of it helps you win business, but you can&rsquo;t operate without it. So if I weren&rsquo;t working on Covecta, I&rsquo;d seriously consider building a founder-focused AI assistant&hellip; something that kicks in the moment you incorporate on Companies House, with a chain of agents to guide and manage all those time-consuming tasks.</p>
<p id="ember3834" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph">There are around 6 million SMEs in the UK, and plenty of repeat founders juggling multiple ventures. This kind of burden probably eats up 20&ndash;30% of my time &ndash; so maybe there&rsquo;s a business there. Who knows? Let&rsquo;s get an NDA signed!</p>
<p class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph"><img src="https://cdn.sourceflow.co.uk/__gallery/1993f6aa-ebed-4306-a563-2ddf177443ce" alt="" width="600" height="322"></p>
<p id="ember3836" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph"><strong>Want to meet 50+ more innovative AI organisations and technical leaders? Our 'Faces of AI 2025' report is available to <a class="EaWzLdfjwgloMRCqeXHrsnLLcqdpxKtzA " tabindex="0" href="https://www.generativegroup.ai/reports/faces-of-ai-2025/?utm_source=linkedin&amp;utm_medium=social" target="_self" data-test-app-aware-link="">download for free now</a>.</strong></p>
<p id="ember3837" class="ember-view reader-text-block__paragraph"><strong>At Generative, we work with AI-driven startups to scale innovation, refine strategy, and accelerate growth. If you're building in AI and looking for the right talent to take your company to the next level, <a class="EaWzLdfjwgloMRCqeXHrsnLLcqdpxKtzA " tabindex="0" href="https://www.generativegroup.ai/contact-us/" target="_self" data-test-app-aware-link="">let's talk.</a></strong></p>
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With a mission to unlock scalable growth in one of the world’s most complex industries, Covecta is building autonomous AI agents tailored for financial services.

“Curiosity, Drive, and Professional Pride” – Scott Wilson on What it Takes to Build Agentic AI for Financial Services

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