Independent advisory · London
For owners whose land, power or businesses are being drawn into the data-centre and AI build-out, and who want one adviser with no product to sell.
Compute is now an energy question; energy is now a data question. I work at the seam — where an owner’s capital, assets and intentions meet the physical constraints of power, land, silicon and time.
Engagements are by introduction.
Advisory
Counsel from someone who still runs infrastructure, for owners making energy and compute decisions that will outlast them.
01
Where to put a megawatt: connection queues, behind-the-meter generation, heat reuse, and which offers to walk away from.
02
From the rack to the boardroom: what a data centre or an AI-compute allocation actually commits you to, in plain language.
03
Independent thinking for principals who are offered too much certainty by too many people.
Who it is for
Scale is implicit in the problem. What matters is that the decision is yours to make and that it will be hard to undo.
You have been approached about a data-centre lease, a battery site or a connection deal, and you want an independent read of what is really on offer before the lawyers start.
Energy is becoming a board-level cost and compute a board-level dependency. You want an operator’s view on what to own, what to rent and what to walk away from.
You are weighing direct exposure to energy, data centres or AI compute and want a technical second opinion that is not attached to the fund asking for the allocation.
You are being asked to fund a data centre, a solar array or a digital-inclusion programme and need to know whether it is real, whether it will last, and who ends up holding it.
If you are unsure whether the practice is right for you, a short, candid conversation will settle it quickly — in either direction.
Background
I advise from inside businesses I founded and still run. Company names are kept off this page by choice; the roles are stated plainly and can be verified in conversation.
An in-house hardware workshop; engineer-led helpdesk and Microsoft 365 support for UK small and mid-sized organisations on fixed monthly terms; secure data destruction, hardware recycling and device reuse; and a free digital-inclusion programme with short public courses in AI, Python and web fundamentals.
Builds and hosts websites and web applications for owner-run organisations so that they own their systems rather than rent attention. Currently operates more than twenty production sites across two hosts — a dedicated server in Germany and a server estate in London — including TLS, backups, monitoring and a ten-minute stack watch.
Segmented networks, core switching, storage, out-of-band management and guest Wi-Fi, run hands-on. The advice on power, racks and uptime comes from paying for them.
Independent, owner-side, and deliberately small. No product, no fund, no introducer fees.
How I work
Three forms of engagement and one conflicts policy. Every enquiry is read personally and answered within two working days.
A short conversation to decide whether I am the right person. If so, I read everything you have — offers, heads of terms, connection letters, bills, drawings — and come back with a written view in plain English: what is real, what is missing, what I would ask for, and what I would walk away from. Fixed fee, agreed before I start.
A standing relationship with a monthly call, a quarterly written review of your energy and compute position, and access when something lands on your desk. Few retained relationships at any time, so that each one gets read properly.
No commissions, no introducer fees and no success fees from anyone you deal with because of my advice. No product, no fund. If I have an interest in something I recommend, you hear it from me first, in writing.
Work where I would be marketing someone else’s proposal; anything I cannot explain to you in plain language; and situations where the decision is not yours to make.
A fixed-fee, two-to-four-week independent read of a specific proposal: a data-centre lease, a connection offer, an AI-compute allocation, a build-or-buy decision.
A standing relationship with someone who already understands your position before the question arrives.
A seat at the table for owned businesses, foundations or stewardship entities — bringing operating reality into governance.
Stewardship
I help owners build and hold it commercially; I help families and foundations hold some of it in trust. Same discipline, different beneficiary.
Compute, connectivity and energy capacity held under charter for public benefit rather than extraction — governed by multiple signatories, never one person. The live example is the repair workshop and free digital-inclusion programme I run in West London: a place where people get devices mended, learn, and are not sold anything.
For families and principals shaping giving, endowment and infrastructure so that intent survives the founder. I work alongside your solicitors and tax advisers, who lead on structure; my part is making sure what you fund is real, durable and governed as you intended.
Energy assets throw off surplus. Some of it can be directed, by design, to ecological restoration that works in decades rather than news cycles — structured at the outset, not as an afterthought.
The long-term aims of any stewardship vehicle are written down before capital is committed.
Contact
The simplest route is email. If you were introduced by someone, please say so — it helps me understand the context. Engagements are by introduction; the first conversation is not.
London · United Kingdom · I reply within two working days.