The Digital Forge Podcast

Doug Liversidge CBE grew up on a Sheffield council estate, left school at 15, and was told he wasn’t good enough for the company’s graduate programme. It could have been the end of the story. Instead, it became the beginning. In this first episode of  The Digital Forge , Doug reflects on growing up in post-war Sheffield, the teacher who changed his life, his early years at English Steel, winning a...

Richard Stubbs believes Britain has been looking at health the wrong way. Not as an economic engine. Not as productivity infrastructure. Not as one of the great determinants of national prosperity. Too often, we treat the NHS as a cost to be managed rather than a platform for growth, prevention and human potential. In Part Two of this conversation with David Richards MBE, Richard argues that poor...

Richard Stubbs grew up in Maltby, in a mining family shaped by the strike, Orgreave and the long shadow of deindustrialisation. His father fought the state on land that would later become the Advanced Manufacturing Park. A generation later, Richard chaired the region’s economic board on that same ground. That journey sits at the heart of Part One of this conversation. In this episode of  The Digit...

Naomi Timperley built her career on visibility. Then it became a threat. In Part Two of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  sits down with Naomi to explore a stalking ordeal that lasted four years, escalated across multiple platforms, and exposed just how unprepared our systems are to deal with this kind of abuse. What began with two brief encounters spiralled into thousands of posts, relent...

Naomi Timperley did not come through the front door of the tech industry. She built her own way in. In Part One of The Digital Forge, David Richards MBE sits down with Naomi to trace a journey that begins in army towns and travel agencies and ends at the very centre of the UK’s technology ecosystem. Born in Devon, raised across military communities, Naomi describes a childhood shaped by movement,...

Simon Biltcliffe did not enter politics because business failed him. He entered because business showed him what failure really looks like when systems are wrong. In Part Two of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  moves beyond the story of Webmart and into something deeper. Power. Politics. Control. And why places like Barnsley were left behind. Simon returns to South Yorkshire not out of no...

Most founders talk about values. Simon Biltcliffe built them into systems. In Part One of this two-part episode of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  sits down with  Simon Biltcliffe , founder of Webmart, one of the most unconventional and quietly radical businesses in Britain. Simon grew up in Staincross outside Barnsley, shaped by community, the miners’ strike, and the hard lessons of dei...

Most founders never talk about the moments that nearly ended them. Ashley Tate does. In Part Two of this two-part episode of The Digital Forge, David Richards MBE returns with Ashley to trace the comeback story. After two brutal lessons in the energy world, Ashley explains how those disasters became the foundation for his biggest success. This episode is the truth about rebuilding. Ashley tells th...

Ashley Tate built his first business before most people finish school. In Part One of this two-part episode of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  sits down with Ashley to unpack the early years of a career shaped by instinct, experimentation and hard lessons learned the long way round. Growing up in Dronfield and Sheffield, Ashley always knew he wanted to work for himself. At sixteen he was...

Part Two of the Volker Hirsch story begins where most careers would have ended. Fresh from being arrested and held in a Maltese jail in the collapse of a dot-com era mobile incubator, Volker Hirsch had a choice. Retreat to safety or build again. He chose the harder path. In this episode of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  follows Volker through the aftermath. How he rebuilt his career, mo...

Volker Hirsch has lived several technology lifetimes in one career. In Part One of this two-part episode of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  sits down with Volker to trace an extraordinary journey that begins in German law firms and runs straight through the first mobile revolution, the rise of social gaming, and the peak of BlackBerry’s dominance. Volker left a successful legal career to...

Tim Craggs is building technology that could change how we understand disease. In this episode of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  sits down with  Tim Craggs , founder and CEO of  Exciting Instruments , a University of Sheffield spin-out developing a new generation of tools for single-molecule research. What once required vast, expensive machines in specialist labs can now sit on a bencht...

In this episode of  The Digital Forge Podcast , David Richards MBE sits down with  Dan Ridsdale , Head of Technology, Media and Telecoms at Edison Group, to get inside the mind of the modern tech investor. After more than 25 years analysing listed technology companies and working with management teams across the UK and Europe, Dan has a rare view of what really moves markets - and what does not. ...

Bruce Katz is one of the most influential thinkers on cities and metropolitan economies. He has advised US Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, shaped national policy, and helped city leaders around the world rebuild their economies from the ground up. In this episode of The Digital Forge, David Richards MBE sits down with Katz for a wide-ranging conversation about the future of place, power...

In November 1983, six armed men broke into a Brink’s-Mat warehouse near Heathrow Airport and stole three tonnes of gold bullion worth £26 million. Led by Brian Robinson and Micky McAvoy, the gang thought they were taking cash. What they found changed British crime forever. As the investigation unfolded, the trail led far beyond London to Sheffield. The stolen bullion had been melted down and disgu...

Inside a quiet building in Sheffield, every piece of precious metal, gold, silver, platinum, and palladium, still carries a mark that has defined trust for more than 250 years. The Sheffield hallmark. In this episode of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  meets  Ashley Carson , the city’s longest-serving Assay Master. From apprentice to leader, Ashley has spent nearly fifty years testing and...

For decades, Britain has talked about innovation while letting its factories fall silent. Now, from a cluster of hangars and labs on the edge of Sheffield, a new industrial revolution is taking shape. In this episode of  The Digital Forge ,  David Richards MBE  talks with  Ben Morgan , Chief Executive of the  Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC)  — the organisation leading Britain’s retur...

In this episode of The Digital Forge, David Richards MBE sits down with Louisa Harrison-Walker OBE, Chief Executive of the Sheffield Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Louisa speaks with rare honesty about reaching breaking point after the death of a close friend, the mental health struggles that followed, and how time away helped her reset her life, her leadership, and her priorities. From that de...

Host David Richards sits down with Adam Pollock to explore his journey from barrister and private investigator to broker and investment banker. Adam breaks down what investment banking is really about, why the UK doesn’t lack money but needs to allocate it better, and how pensions and the EIS scheme fit into the picture. He also shines a spotlight on the talent and innovative businesses thriving i...