Jon Naylor
Supply chain and scale-up
Since 1995 I have been involved in designing, manufacturing, project managing or selling technical products. From an apprentice to a senior manager, I’ve walked every step of the journey inbusinesses of all shapes and sizes in the UK, USA and Spain. Along the way I’ve tried to learn all I can about how ideas are defined, designed, developed and ultimately dragged across the finish line into saleable products.
In July 2021 I got the opportunity to put everything I’d learned from 20+ years’ worth of projects into a single product with a UK tech start-up. That tested me in ways unlike any job has ever done before. I built a small team and together, with a bit of help from our friends, we turned a prototype into a fully approved product which was deployed at opposite ends of the globe. During those two frenetic years I saw with my own eyes the enormity of the challenges and issues that the start-up faced whilst trying to turn their idea into a product.
Simple issues that larger businesses deal with easily can become an Everest for start-ups. Building a product, reducing risk and increasing the value of the business is a process. Like any process, it is definable, manageable and repeatable. In a start-up that process needs to be done as quickly as possible before the money runs out.
I run a company called Five Rise Tech www.fiverisetech.com and work with the Zuas team on technology scale-up assignments.