Tim Mutlow is Chief Technical Officer (CTO) at Operance; he oversees everything to do with technology at Operance – from software development to security and making sure we have the best technology there is to serve our customers. 

We caught up with Tim to find out more about his background and vision for the future of construction tech.  

Chief Technology Officer is pretty much exactly what it says on the tin. It covers every aspect of technology in the company.  

My main role is software development, but as we’ve grown, there are other areas I’m responsible for, such as cybersecurity, infrastructure and general IT.  

We have a growing software development team and we’re looking for a Senior Developer to take on some of the work I am doing so I can concentrate on other areas of the business.  

Recently, we’ve been working with two interns, which has been fantastic – it’s our ambition to develop our people and we regularly work with universities and colleges to find and develop the best talent. 

We’re a small and growing company so I’m wearing a lot of hats at the moment, but it’s great to be in a role where I can bring everything I enjoy under one umbrella.  

I have broad experience in technology and digital in lots of industries. For example, one of my first roles was in a banking environment – I helped developed internet banking, web services and secure mobile apps for two big international banks. It was a wide-ranging role, and I believe this has given me a good foundation working in construction when it is becoming more regulated and digitised.   

I’ve also had experience running a small business – I founded Happy Goon with a friend based in New York – and even lived overseas for a time. Happy Goon merged Augmented Reality (AR) and greetings cards, which on the surface sounds vastly different from what we’re doing at Operance. However, AR has a lot of scope in the construction industry – overlaying data on real-world objects.   

It was around this time when I started freelancing – web development and any software that touches the internet. I began working with Operance CEO Ian Yeo and CPO Scott Pilgrim, and this led to a full-time position as my role grew and grew.  

Ian Yeo (CEO), Scott Pilgrim (CPO) and Tim Mutlow (CTO). Photo: Shaun Flannery

Construction is already undergoing a digital transformation – Building Information Modelling (BIM) makes the design and construction process a lot more efficient, saving companies a lot of money.  

At Operance, we’re taking this to the next level and also focusing on building safety.  

There’s an incredible amount of data required in Operations and Maintenance files before a building’s handover. However, this information is rarely looked at again beyond handover. We’re building a product around this problem, making sure people have the confidence in O&M information – creating something trackable, searchable, useable and enforceable.  

As I mentioned, the industry is becoming more regulated and more compliance is required by building owners, contractors and designers. For example, the new Building Safety Bill requires a Golden Thread of information that spans the entire lifecycle of a building.  

It shouldn’t be a stick to hit people with; instead, we’re creating something that unlocks a lot of potential for a building – more insights into your data = operations efficiencies, cost savings and a reduction in environmental impact.  

The fact that I can put my stamp on everything. It’s been a totally blank canvas and that’s been great.  

On top of this, there are so many bits to enjoy – the data transparency we’re trying to create is good for the environment, for tenants, communities and for landlords and builders.

Get in touch with Tim via tim.mutlow@operance.app or via LinkedIn.

Over the last nine months, Nigel has offered his wealth of experience and expertise and supported us to get us where we are today – launching a brand new piece of software to help improve the safety of buildings across the UK. 

We caught up with Nigel to find out more about his background and vision for the future of construction. 

Being Chairman of the Board means that I’m responsible for assisting and giving guidance to the board of directors at Operance, as well as holding them to account to their shareholders. 

With my experience in management consultancy and digital transformation, I support the team, providing them with advice during a monthly board meeting.

My degree is in Computer Science and Maths – I went to the University of Glasgow. During the summer holidays, I worked for a firm of building contractors, which led me to create a 3D simulation of a building for my third-year project. 

This was around the late 1980s when 3D modelling in construction was quite new. 

After graduating, my career went down the Management Consultancy route, where I worked with various tech, computing and software organisations. 

Around the year 2000, I got involved in some smaller companies, including one we successfully turned around and successfully floated on AIM on the London Stock Exchange. At this point, I also started investing in companies and became Chairman of several organisations in Scotland, such as Administrate. 

Two years ago, I moved back to where I was born – Northumberland. I wanted to get involved in local companies and use my expertise to help businesses in the region. This led to being introduced to Bimsense and Operance through Mercia, who I’d known for a long time.

 CEO Ian Yeo, CPO Scott Pilgrim, Chairman Nigel Hedley, CTO Tim Mutlow

I realised there’s a huge opportunity for the industry here – the progress the construction industry has made since the Second World War is very slow compared to other sectors. 

I also get along very well with the Directors Ian, Scott and Tim and think the work they’re doing to bring digital to construction is essential.

There are many different reasons, but the main one’s centre around productivity, environment and safety. 

Safety is, of course, a huge factor – not only during construction but also throughout the entire lifecycle of the building. 

If you look at the tragic events of Grenfell, you can see real change is needed. We are working closely with the Golden Thread initiative to help developers and social housing associations digitise their records and define, curate, audit and maintain information about a building from design to occupation.

Modern methods of construction and modern materials require technology to construct buildings to more exacting measures. Meanwhile, technology can also help reduce emissions and pollution during both the construction and lifespan of the building.

It’s been a tough year for many businesses, and within Bimsense and Operance, we’ve had our ups and downs. However, it’s been rewarding as Chairman to see the team working hard to overcome challenges – they’ve never hidden their heads in the sand and always dealt with issues head-on. 

It’s a pleasure to be working with Ian, Scott and Tim.

To speak to one of the team for more information, call 0800 464 3316

The exercise led us to design an entirely new and innovative Operance O&M Coordination web-app solution that provides the following benefits;

O&M: clients can now define, automate and standardise uniform organisational Operations and Maintenance (O&M) information requirements, workflows, handover procedures and 24/7 O&M manual anytime, anywhere access.
BIM: end-users can now easily understand the benefits of BIM and COBie data and information, accessing models to create automated works packages for their supply chain to populate.
Golden-Thread: working with the UK’s biggest social housing developers and global standards developers, we are helping not only create new Development Handover Data Standards that will provide clarity and uniformity in respect of building safety information but also create an ownership and responsibility audit trail.
With this product vision in place, we are about to release some big news in respect of how this will be funded; in the meantime, we are looking for developers to help build the vision!

Because we are a small team at the moment, you will be expected to wear many different “hats” during the workday; you will produce code as you’d expect, but also provide analysis and contribute to testing other developers’ work.

As we are a growing development team, you will play an important role in helping to define our process and best practice as well as the tools, platforms, and even languages that we use! There is a lot of responsibility, but also a lot of creative freedom and chance to express yourself, grow and learn which makes for truly rewarding work.

Click here for more details.

Becoming a Junior Developer within our software development team, the successful candidate would be working on our digital solutions which tackle various scenarios from the construction industry. You will work alongside our lead developer to help build cloud software solutions by developing new features, fixing bugs, and generally producing quality code and getting stuck into the development process.

As well as producing your own code, you will also get to perform code reviews on other developers code which will help enhance your knowledge of the language and the system we are building. Unlike some other roles, you will also be helping to test other developers’ code against requirements.

As we are a growing development team, you will play an important role in helping to define our process and best practice as well as the tools, platforms, and even languages that we use! There is a lot of creative freedom afforded here and the work you do will be visible to stakeholders making this a great opportunity to show what you can do as well as grow, learn, and really contribute to some amazing products.

Click here for more details.

Further reading

Building Information Modelling (BIM) – Wikipedia

BIM Glossary of Terms – Bimsense

Scott Pilgrim scott.pilgrim@bimsense.co.uk 0113 3281282 Twitter LinkedIn