ICS.AI Company Day: Coming Together in Nottingham for Strategy, Insight and Celebration

On Friday we brought ICS.AI together in Nottingham for our latest Company Day - a chance to step away from the day-to-day and get the whole team in one room.

As a remote-first business, with colleagues spread right across the country, days like this matter. They're the moments where our team stops being a Teams grid of faces and becomes a room full of people swapping notes, sharing wins, and reminding each other why we do what we do.

A day built around strategy and direction

The day opened with a whole-company session, welcoming fourteen new starters since we last met face to face - a reminder of just how fast ICS.AI continues to grow - alongside a round of well-earned promotions across the business.

We were also delighted to welcome guests into the room. Daniel Batts, Head of Commercial for the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), joined us as an external guest speaker. And representing CommsCo, our media and PR partner, Leah Jones and Joana Caya were back with us again, having become familiar and valued faces at ICS.AI events over the past year.

Martin's vision: the next generation of ICS.AI

Our CEO Martin Neale opened the day by grounding everything in the reason ICS.AI exists; helping public services become more financially sustainable through AI, at a time when the pressures on local government, education and the wider public sector have never been greater.

He talked through the company's journey in three distinct chapters - from our early NLP chatbot days, through the shift to Generative AI that reshaped the business a few years ago, and now into what he called our third generation: a step-change in how quickly and safely we can build and deploy software for our customers, so that the outcomes we promise - real savings, real efficiency, real impact for the people who rely on public services - land faster and more reliably than ever.

Running through all of it was our long-standing mantra: velocity, velocity, velocity - recognising what AI can do, keeping pace with how fast it's changing, and staying ahead of the market as a result. It's a theme that's carried through every Company Day for a while now, and this one was no exception.

Product, delivery and what's next

Later sessions brought that vision to life. Our product team shared where the roadmap is heading next, with a strong focus on validating ideas with customers early - so that what we build lands exactly where it's needed, faster. Our delivery team talked through how we're continuing to evolve our ways of working with councils and universities, building on what already works well and going further - deepening the support we offer through a customer's AI journey, so the benefits of transformation keep compounding long after go-live.

Growth to be proud of

FY26 was a landmark year for ICS.AI, and the Company Day was as much a celebration of that as it was a look ahead. Our marketing team's roundup of the year included a genuinely fantastic set of numbers around velocity and thought leadership: 94 blogs, 50+ videos, 3,500 leads, 3 national research surveys published, 152 media placements reaching over 170 million people, and 319 G-Cloud submissions. Alongside a growing customer base across local government and education, and a team that keeps expanding to match it, it's been a year of real momentum - and the room was rightly proud of it.

A view from inside government

One of the highlights of the day was hearing directly from Daniel Batts about the shifting landscape in government technology - from the shift he's observed moving from curiosity to delivery, to the growing conversation around open APIs, interoperability, and reducing the lock-in that has traditionally slowed public sector transformation.

Daniel grounded his talk with a story about his aunt, in her nineties, who - despite being sharp and independent - finds the systems around her increasingly hard to navigate as she gets older. It was a good reminder of what all of this is really for: not clever demos or AI theatre, but making public services feel a little less confusing and a little more human for the people who rely on them every day.

He left us with a simple challenge for any company serious about public sector AI: be proven, be safe, be open, be practical, and be easy to buy. Five tests that felt like a fitting bookend to everything else discussed that afternoon.

In their own words

Talking to people throughout the day, one thing came through again and again: for a remote-first team, days like this aren't a nice-to-have - they're what holds the culture together.

Andrew put it simply:

"For me it's about getting together. As a remote organisation, it's sometimes quite difficult to really connect with the people you work with. The fact we can get together and connect the personality with the face is really important. I think for new starters especially - it's a great opportunity for them to meet the people they’re going to be working with. These days are absolutely vital to our organisation and our culture."

Oli spoke about the support that runs through the team day to day:

"Every day is different and there are always new challenges, but every time I ask for help, anytime I need support or assistance, everyone is really happy to help - it really makes it an easy place to get stuck in."

Aneeq echoed the value of simply being in the same room:

"I love being on site with my colleagues - we're mostly remote and all over the UK, and it's really hard to get time to sit with your colleagues, talk about things that are not just about work, and actually connect as a team. It's really valuable to get visibility of all the other teams too - hearing from tech, delivery, finance and leadership on where the company is going really brings us together, focused on how we move forward."

Ending with celebration

After a packed afternoon, the evening shifted gears entirely - a chance to relax, celebrate the year's achievements, and properly catch up with colleagues usually only seen through a screen. With people travelling in from all over the UK, it was a great reminder of just how connected a distributed team can be when everyone's in the same room.

Fiona Watson, ICS.AI's CMO, shared:

"Days like this are what keep a remote-first team feeling like one team. It's easy to lose that sense of connection when you're spread across the country but get everyone in a room for a day like this and you feel it straight away - the energy, the ideas, the genuine excitement about where we're headed. Nottingham gave us a brilliant space to reflect on the year, welcome new faces properly, and head into the next one with real momentum."

Thank you

A huge thank you to everyone who travelled in to make the day happen and to our all speakers for their thoughtful updates and perspectives. Here's to a great financial year ahead.

ICS.AI is growing fast, and we're always on the lookout for brilliant people to join us. Take a look at our current open roles if you'd like to be part of days like this one.

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