DETAILS
Date: October 9, 2025
Location: Arup Office, 80 Charlotte St., London W1T 4QS
Host Sponsor: Arup
Networking Co-Sponsors: Capgemini, Additive Catchments, and Google
Access: View presentations and photos below.
OVERVIEW
The 2nd SWAN London UnConference was held at Arup’s offices on October 9th, 2025 focused on the theme, “From Data to Trust: Shaping Our Environmental Future.”
The collaborative event unpacked utility challenges and smart water opportunities stemming from the knowledge of attendees. This empowered everyone to share their expertise through an unfiltered exchange of innovative ideas.
Session Recaps
Programme
All underlined text is clickable.
8:00–9:00 Registration and Coffee
9:00–9:10 Workshop Welcome
- Will Cavendish, Global Digital Services Lead (Arup)
- Shirley Ben-Dak, Senior Advisor (SWAN Forum)
- Eoghan Kilroy, Head of Waste Water Strategy (Wessex Water)
9:40–10:30 Big Brain’ Attendee Contributions + Voting
Attendees were encouraged to propose and vote on theme-based discussion topics on the “Big Brain” (a Big Board with all of your great ideas).
Selected topics:
- Is our problem a lack of innovation or a problem to do something with it? Facilitated By Matt Hughes (Anglian Water)
- How do you “fast follow” an AI industry that is changing every day? Facilitated by Mitch Donnelly (FIDO) and Emma Call (Atos)
- How can we change the regulator <> utility dynamic to reward outcomes based procurements? Facilitated by Rob Passmore (Additive Catchments)
- Change management- bringing people along the journey to adapt digital platforms. Facilitated by Vikki Williams (Arup) and Sahil Chaini (Transcend)
- How do we re-engineer an engineer with data? Facilitated by Tracy Britton (Stantec)
- How many measurements are needed for true water quality validation? Facilitated by Alistair MacKinnon (NIVUS)
- How can increased automation within the network enable sustainable outcomes? Facilitated by Andy Withers (Rotork)
10:30–11:00 Networking and Coffee Break
11:00–12:30 Session 1: Unpacking Challenges & Opportunities
Each group narrowed down the different challenges to one challenge statement that they would like explore further. Helpful guidelines/handouts were available to support this creative ideation process.
12:30–13:30 Lunch Sponsored by Arup
- Rob Passmore, Co-Founder & CEO (Additive Catchments) & Liam Varndell, Customer Engineering Manager (Google Cloud)
13:50–14:45 Session 2: The Power of Brainstorming
Each group suggested solutions to address their proposed challenge statement, encouraging as many ideas as possible.
14:45–15:15 Networking and Coffee Break
15:15–16:00 Session 3: Let’s Tie it Together
Each group determined one solution and collaborated to produce a tangible output (e.g. diagram, guidelines, roadmap) to showcase to the collective group.
16:00–16:50 Session 4: Rapid-Fire Recap
Each group briefly shared their main findings, including an open discussion on how each concept can tie together in a final combined output to be shared with SWAN Members.
16:50–17:00 Summary & Conclusion
- Will Cavendish, Global Digital Services Lead (Arup)
17:00–19:30 Networking Reception Sponsored by Capgemini, Google Cloud, and Additive Catchments
Held on the venue rooftop with light food and drinks.
Photos
