Founder • Researcher • Builder
Building the Intelligence Layer for Global Trade.
Founder and researcher building intelligence and digital infrastructure for more observable, trusted, and accessible global trade.
Making capability visible and opportunity accessible.
Trade Intelligence
AI & Trust Systems
Digital Trade Infrastructure
SME International Trade
The Question Driving My Work
Markets allocate opportunity based on what they can observe. Yet many capable businesses remain underserved because the information needed to understand them is fragmented, incomplete, or difficult to trust.
Information shapes how opportunity flows.
Capability cannot create opportunity unless it can be observed.
Trade has an information problem before it has a capital problem.
From a Finance Problem to an Information Problem
My interest in this work began through conversations with SME exporters. Again and again, I heard the same challenge: suppliers expected to be paid upfront, international buyers demanded payment terms, and access to working capital was limited.
At first, I thought the problem was access to finance. But conversations with exporters, banks, trade associations, development organizations, and other ecosystem participants revealed something deeper.
Although each participant experienced different challenges, they were often constrained by the same underlying issue: insufficient trusted information.
I thought the problem was finance.
Exporters repeatedly described severe working capital constraints.
I spoke with the ecosystem.
Exporters, banks, trade associations, and development organizations all saw different symptoms.
I discovered the underlying issue.
Everyone was making important decisions with incomplete trusted information.
Today
I explore how intelligence and digital infrastructure can make global trade more observable and trusted.
Areas of Contribution
Through research, intelligence, and product development, I explore how information can make global trade more observable, trusted, and accessible.
Trade Intelligence
Studying how information creates trust, coordination, and opportunity in global trade.
AI & Trust Systems
Applying machine intelligence to support better trade decisions and trusted interactions.
Digital Trade Infrastructure
Designing digital systems that improve the observability of trade.
SME International Trade
Reducing barriers that prevent capable businesses from participating globally.
Timbukti
Building products and infrastructure that translate these ideas into practical tools for global trade.
Evidence & Insights
My work is informed by conversations with exporters, financial institutions, trade associations, and other participants across the trade ecosystem.
Field Conversations
Conversations with exporters have highlighted recurring challenges around trust, information, and access to working capital.
Financing Insights
Initial survey work among Kenyan horticulture exporters suggests that more than 75% experience their largest cash-flow pressures before shipment.
Based on exploratory field research.
System-Level Patterns
Banks, associations, and development organizations often face different manifestations of the same information challenges.
Timbukti
Applying these insights through products and digital infrastructure for global trade.
Questions I'm Exploring
These are some of the questions currently shaping my thinking and research.
Why do many capable SMEs remain invisible to markets?
How is trust established at global scale?
What information reduces uncertainty in SME finance?
What would a modern operating system for global trade look like?
How can intelligence make global trade more observable?
Latest Writing
Essays, notes, and observations on trade intelligence, trust systems, and digital infrastructure.
Essays on Trade Intelligence
Reflections on information asymmetries, trust systems, and the future of global trade.
Building Digital Trade Infrastructure
Exploring how infrastructure can improve observability and opportunity.
Questions on SME Competitiveness
Notes from conversations with exporters and ecosystem participants.
Voices from the Trade Ecosystem
Observations and recurring themes from conversations with exporters, financial institutions, trade associations, and other ecosystem participants.
"Banks take so long that by the time financing is approved, the season is almost over."
"Access to finance remains difficult because very few institutions understand our business."
"Trust and credibility information on buyers would significantly improve financing decisions."
"Many participants in trade appear to be solving different manifestations of the same information problem."
Interested in Conversations Around...
Trade Intelligence • AI & Trust Systems • Digital Trade Infrastructure • SME Competitiveness • Global Trade
I enjoy conversations with exporters, financial institutions, researchers, development organizations, investors, and others interested in the future of global trade.