Advisory and consulting
Four kinds of problem, all of them the same problem: something has to work, the consequences of it not working are real, and somebody needs to know whether it will.
For investors and boards
Is this buildable, by this team, on this timeline, on this budget? Thomas has been on the other side of that question — writing the plan, defending it to investors and customers, and then having to deliver it — which tends to sharpen the reading of someone else’s.
Hardware and deep tech in particular, where the gap between a working prototype and a production-ready system is where most of the risk actually lives, and where a deck rarely shows it.
For founders and leadership teams
The problems that arrive between the first prototype and the first serious customer, on both sides of the business. On the engineering side: architecture decisions that become the foundation, or the legacy, for years to come; functional safety brought in while it can still shape the design; and hiring the first ten engineers. On the commercial side: the go-to-market, the first partnerships, customer and supplier negotiations, and a plan, budget and raise sized to reach the milestone you promised.
At Chassis Autonomy the title was CTO, but the role covered both: strategy, budgets, partnerships, marketing and every funding round, alongside the engineering. That included £3.2M of non-dilutive funding, written and won without a single failed application. Most founders either leave it on the table or spend months chasing the wrong grant. Knowing which competition to enter, and when not to apply at all, is most of the skill.
For manufacturers and their suppliers
Taking a system from concept through specification, attribute development and sign-off to production — with standards such as ISO 26262 treated as an engineering discipline rather than a documentation exercise.
Braking and by-wire actuation is where Thomas has done this most, at McLaren, Bentley, Jaguar Land Rover, Nissan, NEVS and Chassis Autonomy. The method is the constant; the sector is not.
For forces and their suppliers
Blue-light fleets are electrifying and, at the same time, buying vehicles with substantial ADAS content — against frameworks, conversion supply chains, workshop capability and driver training regimes that were not designed for either.
We have worked on that from both sides: with forces at the business level on procurement, operations and whole-life decisions, and at the vehicle level with the engineering teams setting the standards and methods to define and prove that vehicles will be safe in service, for officers and for the public.
A named engineer with a delivery record — not a pyramid of graduates on a day rate.
Delivery
Asking for two more engineers is usually another way of saying the programme is behind.
Two contractors at a low hourly rate is one answer, and sometimes the right one, in which case it is work for someone else; however, it is rarely the cheapest answer once you count the weeks before either person is genuinely productive, the senior engineer’s time spent supervising them, and the judgement neither was hired for.
Knowing when a rigid process is protecting the programme and when it is in the way, and how to work around one that is wrong without losing its original purpose, comes only from having done the work in start-ups and global manufacturers, Formula 1 and police fleets, across both lightly and heavily process-driven organisations. It cannot be taught, and it is rarely what a day rate buys.
Instead, we deliver the whole scope: Thomas leads a team of experienced engineers he has worked with before, so there is no onboarding curve and no supervision drawn out of your team. Carbon Six carries the contract, the coordination and the accountability — one party answerable for the outcome, rather than several answerable for their timesheets. Thomas’ own oversight comes with the team; it is often not a separate line on the invoice, and it does not stop at the boundary of the scope.
The rate is the wrong number to compare. The useful comparison is what the delivered scope costs in total, and how much of your own organisation it consumes on the way.
As for size — as big as the programme needs. Thomas has delivered for the Metropolitan Police, South Yorkshire Police and NEVS at the head of teams, and built an engineering organisation of twenty-five across two countries at Chassis Autonomy. Leading engineers is not something that stopped when he founded Carbon Six.
What we will not do is put someone on your programme who has not worked with us before, or staff it with juniors and call that leverage.
How it works
A call, no charge. Half an hour. You describe the problem; we tell you honestly whether we are the right people for it. Quite often we are not, and saying so quickly is worth more to both of us than a proposal.
A written scope. If it looks like a fit, you get the question stated plainly, what we will do, what you will have at the end, and what it costs. One page, not a pitch document.
The work. Days or weeks, not open-ended retainers. We would rather answer a question properly and leave than be permanently half-engaged.
Something you can use without us. Every engagement ends with a decision made, a capability transferred, or both. On the public sector work, the point was always that the team could carry on making those calls after we had gone.
Get in touch
Tell us what has to work and what happens if it doesn’t. That is usually enough to come back with something useful.
Send us a message