Dan Hydes is one of IgniteData’s Co-founders – he’s currently Managing Director, so he’s right at the front of Ignite’s work. This week I sat down with him for a chat; we covered everything from what a normal day looks like, to his proudest achievement, and what big tech advance he’s expecting to see over the coming years.
What’s your background, what brought you to IgniteData?
Looking back, the idea for IgniteData was something that stemmed from a previous business I co-founded. With that business we were working on feasibility and patient recruitment, but in a much more manual way than we are with IgniteData now. That experience really taught me how difficult patient recruitment can be, it’s slow and inefficient, and often really expensive. When I met Rich (Yeatman, IgniteData Co-founder), we got talking about the ways we could use data to improve the whole process of patient recruitment. Rich really provided the technical insight and expertise that allows Ignite Data to automate so many of the processes involved, minimising human error and speculation that was involved with patient recruitment in the past.
What does a typical day’s work look like for you?
We’re at a critical point with the business so it’s really an all hands-on deck approach at the moment! My main focus is winning work, which I then pass on to Rich and his team as they handle delivery of that work to ensure high quality outputs – so every contract is a team effort, and we work very closely together.
As the business grows, I think my aims will shift slightly; I’d like to do more of the cool strategic innovation stuff going forward. Ultimately that’ll help future customers as we’re working on developing new platforms and ways of doing things that I really think will blow people away.
What achievement are you most proud of?
This sounds a bit cheesy but we’ve gone from sitting in a café with what we thought was a brilliant idea, to then taking that idea to industry where it’s been validated – we’ve proved it works, and super bright people have agreed with us! That’s a really amazing thing for me.
Since we won our first contract I think the biggest thing has been getting repeat business. It’s all well and good delivering work, but when the customer comes back and wants to work with you again – that’s a really good feeling, we know we’ve delivered something that’s of a very high quality.
What do you think will be the biggest tech advancement in the not too distant future?
Machine learning. I can’t say too much at the moment until we have contracts signed off but we’re in the process of finalising details on a new project with Knowledge Transfer Partnerships. Hopefully we’ll be able to expand Ignite Data’s offering with machine learning over the next few years. I’m really excited about it, keep an eye on the blog for details once we’ve got everything signed and sealed!
If you’re not at Ignite Data HQ in Reading, where are you?
I’m really into fitness, at the end of May I’m heading north to cycle from Fort William round the coast to Inverness. I’m looking forward to that but I’ve been really busy and haven’t managed to get much training in so it’ll be interesting! My partner’s a yoga teacher too so I get roped into that every so often too. Aside from that if I’m not at work I’m running around after my son and daughter and spending time with family.
