Starpave is run by an operator, not an outside advisor. I sit at the leadership table with SME founders, CEOs and CFOs — and translate AI from technical possibility into commercial value. Grounded in building and running AI businesses, not slideware.
The approach
Plenty of people can build with AI now. The edge isn't whether you can — it's where you build. I go into regulated, relationship-heavy markets where I already have standing: real relationships, hard-won sector knowledge, distribution others can't easily replicate. Ventures start with an advantage instead of starting cold.
That same operator lens is what I bring to the firms I advise. Not strategy from the outside looking in — practical judgement from someone who lives with the consequences of AI decisions in his own businesses.
I build AI-native ventures in regulated, relationship-heavy markets where I have earned access — and run them as real businesses.
I help established firms find where AI actually pays, do it safely and commercially, and ship it — hands-on, not just decks.
Everything I advise, I've done. The counsel is grounded in building, not theory.
The SME gap
SMEs know the pivot to AI isn't optional. What they lack isn't will — it's the skill and the bandwidth to do it well, and someone who can bridge what the technology can do and what the business actually needs.
Big companies have teams for this. Most SMEs have a founder or leadership team already stretched thin. That's the gap I close: sitting at the leadership table, translating AI into commercial decisions, and driving the work to a result.
The record
A record of building real things and advising at founder level — across ventures, contracts, and live engagements.
Built & shipped
Designed and built a systematic-trading system from scratch — multi-agent AI, institutional-grade risk governance, full audit trail. Direct proof the operator behind the advice can build, not just specify.
Helped a defence-sector client go from standing start to a signed government contract in intelligent perimeter security.
Built the digital presence and the case that helped charities win major, multi-million-pound grant funding.
Where I'm working now
Building adjacent communities and new revenue streams around a highly successful core.
Driving efficiencies and opening new revenue through membership and scheme design.
Turning a rich, underused data asset into commercial advantage.
Helping international scale-ups multiply customers and revenue as they expand into new markets.
Sharp analysis. The business genuinely understood. Priority projects and ROI, identified fast. — Consistent feedback from founders. Names withheld; discretion is part of the job.
Advisory
New revenue lines, products and offers that AI makes viable for the first time. Not efficiency tinkering — top-line growth.
The repetitive, expensive, slow parts of your operation — automated or accelerated, safely and commercially.
Meeting your regulatory and compliance obligations with AI working for you, not against you — cutting the risk of fines, breaches and reputational damage.
I work hands-on with founders and leadership teams — strategy through to shipping. Fractional or project-based. Scope set per engagement.
Talk to me →About
I'm Ian Pratley. After 25 years in enterprise technology — Oracle, Cisco, ServiceNow — I left the salary behind on one principle: only build where you have an unfair advantage.
I started with the hardest thing I could find — a systematic-trading platform, built from the ground up: multi-agent AI, institutional-grade risk governance, a full audit trail. Complex, live, and profitable. The lesson stuck: make AI deliver real value in a domain that unforgiving, and you can make it deliver anywhere — as long as someone treats it as a commercial problem, not a technology experiment.
That's what I do now. I build AI-native ventures in regulated, relationship-heavy markets where I have earned access — and I bring that operator's perspective to SME founders and CFOs who know they have to move on AI but don't have the bandwidth to do it well. I sit at the leadership table, translate the technical into the commercial, and drive it to a result.
Everything I advise, I've done. That's the whole point of Starpave.
Contact
Tell me what you're trying to do with AI. If there's a fit, I'll be straight with you about it.