Altaire

What Altaire does

Altaire is a UK-based senior advisory firm founded in 1999 that helps enterprise clients in regulated and consumer-critical industries make consequential technology decisions, with a current emphasis on AI enablement. Its client base spans retail (Sainsbury's, Argos, Sainsbury's Bank, LEGO), aviation (NATS), healthcare (NHS), travel and cruise (Carnival UK, Flight Centre), defence (British Army), and technology (Adobe), with multi-year relationships including a 17-year Digital Studio engagement with Sainsbury's. The firm's offering is structured as four service lines: Executive Workshops, AI Enablement, Technology Advisory, and Delivery, typically combined into bespoke engagements led by senior practitioners.

The firm's technology foundation is built on the legacy Active Content Platform (ACP), an AI-driven real-time personalisation engine that served 100 million users at one million transactions per second, first deployed to 20 million users in 2012. ACP has been withdrawn from sale and the firm now demonstrates ongoing engineering capability through SocratiCode, a codebase intelligence engine released as free open-source software on GitHub. There is no actively monetised software product; the current surface is advisory-led with optional delivery ownership.

Altaire makes money exclusively through professionally scoped advisory and delivery engagements. Pricing is not publicly disclosed and each engagement is bespoke. The go-to-market is sales-led and by introduction only: there is no RFP response, no competitive tendering, and no paid acquisition; engagements begin with a direct email to [email protected] reaching a director personally, followed by an hour-long conversation, then scoping. The firm deliberately remains small (11-50 employees), scales through an accredited network of trusted specialist delivery partners, and serves clients in the UK, Europe, the US and Asia. The team is led by Managing Director Steve Ball and Operations Director Dr Eleanor Ball, with directors and heads covering international and enterprise (Frank Dittmar), commercial (Nick Drew), compliance (Martin Henwood), and applied AI (Giancarlo Erra).

Name

Altaire

Legal name

Altaire Limited

Website

https://altaire.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

1999

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Altaire is a UK-based senior advisory firm founded in 1999 that helps enterprise clients in regulated industries make consequential technology and AI decisions through Executive Workshops, AI Enablement, Technology Advisory, and Delivery services, engaging by introduction only.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Technology Consulting

NAICS

Management Consulting Services (54161), Administrative Management and General Management Consulting Services (541611), Other Scientific and Technical Consulting Services (54169)

SIC

Services-Management Consulting Services (8742), Services-Engineering, Accounting, Research, Management (8700), Services-Management Services (8741)

akta.pro primary industry

Strategy & IT Advisory (BPAEAAAA)

Keywords

• Technology advisory services
• AI consulting services
• Digital transformation advisory
• Executive technology workshops
• Technology strategy consulting

Headquarters

HQ city

Southampton

HQ country

United Kingdom

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Technology or R&D, Others

Revenue model

1. Professional Advisory Services: Senior advisory and consulting engagements for technology decisions, AI enablement, executive workshops, technology advisory, and delivery services. Revenue is generated through professional services engagements scoped individually for each client.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

Altaire is a senior technology advisory firm that sells professional services to enterprise and government clients across four service lines: Executive Workshops (leadership working sessions on AI strategy), AI Enablement (moving organisations from pilot to production with safe-by-design adoption), Technology Advisory (senior judgement on complex technology decisions), and Delivery (full accountability for technology outcomes, resourced via Altaire's senior team or its network of trusted specialist partners). Engagements are individually scoped, senior-led, and delivered by the practitioners who win the work.

Product overview

Altaire is a senior advisory firm offering a portfolio of professional services rather than a unified software product. Their core offerings include Executive Workshops (practical AI strategy sessions for leadership), AI Enablement (guided adoption from pilot to production), Technology Advisory (senior judgement on complex technology decisions), and Delivery (full accountability for technology outcomes). The firm previously built and operated the Active Content Platform (ACP), an AI-driven real-time personalisation system serving 100 million users at one million transactions per second, which has been withdrawn from sale and is now considered legacy. The company demonstrates ongoing engineering capability through SocratiCode, an open-source codebase intelligence engine available on GitHub. Their service model is advisory-led with optional delivery ownership, not a SaaS platform with user-facing products.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Executive Workshops Practical working sessions for leadership teams that result in a defensible strategic roadmap and a prioritised 90-day path forward, covering where AI genuinely helps versus where it should not be used yet. Audience: enterprise and government leadership teams.
• AI Enablement
• Technology Advisory
• Delivery
• SocratiCode

Quantifiable outcome

• 100 million users served by AI personalisation platform in production
• +3 more outcomes

Named customers9 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

AI capability2 records

Feature1 record

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Specialist Delivery PartnersminorImplementation/ SI/ Consulting PartnerWhere engagements need more hands than Altaire's small senior team, specialist firms are brought in under Altaire's accountability. These are firms Altaire would vouch for and has worked with before. Altaire remains the accountable partner throughout.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves5 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Market position

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/altaireglobal

Compliance3 records

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles8 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Altaire