Arun Nagarajan

Today marks Six months in as SOCPAC CTO, and it somehow feels like both yesterday and six years ago. When I stepped into this role, we were behind the curve. Legacy systems, siloed data, and slow processes held us back. In just half a year, we’ve laid a Foundational Technical Architecture that gave us a modern backbone for data, AI, and autonomy. Since then, we’ve: 1. Unified our digital foundation for secure, scalable operations 2. Embedded AI and LLMs into daily workflows to speed decisions 3. Deployed containerized AI agents across all networks 4. Integrated autonomy at the edge, moving toward true man–machine teaming 5. Shifted our culture from cautious adoption to championing innovation The result? We’re no longer catching up, we’re setting the pace. What once felt like a distant goal is now part of our daily reality. All of this happened in six months, which is why it feels so surreal. It took countless late nights, cross-functional sprints, and the relentless dedication of an amazing team. I'm humbled by the trust the organization placed in me to drive this transformation, and I'm grateful to every person who rolled up their sleeves to make it real. This was truly a team effort, from the junior analysts using our new AI tools to the senior leaders who empowered us to take bold risks. And we’re just getting started. The foundation is in place, but now we get to build on it. In the next chapter, we'll be refining and scaling these capabilities, drilling deeper into AI-enhanced decision-making, and pushing the envelope on autonomous operations. The technology will keep evolving, and so will we. Our goal remains the same: give our operators a decisive edge, making it an extension of the warfighter and keep innovating responsibly. I’m humbled by what the team accomplished in such a short time, and excited for what’s next. The foundation is in place. Now we build on it. Six months down, and the journey is just beginning.

170

19 Comments

We recently released lifecycle reporting in DX, and I’ve loved seeing it help Platform teams build a concrete business case for funding important Platform and DevEx initiatives. While traditional metrics—like build times, pull request merge times, and issue cycle times—offer useful insights, they cover only a narrow slice of developer workflows. They also often fail to distinguish between non-blocking delays (where developers can switch context and stay productive) and true friction points that drain valuable engineering time. Lifecycle reporting helps pinpoint where in the development process teams are experiencing the most friction and delays—and ultimately costing organizations the most. Just like in the screenshot below, I’m seeing companies lose thousands of engineering hours each year to challenges understanding existing code, lengthy CI processes, dev environment issues, and excessive meeting schedules.

123

6 Comments

So which models produce HTML that has the least accessibility errors, and at what cost? Mapped it out here (bottom left is the best). This is helpful for understanding which models are most compliant for those with disabilities and do it efficiently. Qwen and Gemini 2.5 Flash lead the pack. Hat tip to Ben Ogilvie for pointing me to this: aimac.ai

50

2 Comments

The EnFi, Inc team just launched another major customer! I’m still amazed seeing in action what production-level Agentic Architecture unlocks for both customers and platforms. What it means in practice: No more months of ETL. Connect, understand, act, day one. Immediate value: Immediate ~30%+ time and efficiency compression through automation across the process. Step-function jump: Application processing from 1–2 days ➜ ~7–10 minutes. In software terms, that’s wild. Flexes to new use cases. We’re no longer stuck in the rinse-and-repeat of onboarding ➜ product ➜ engineering to ship value. Feedback is built-in. Agents and users surface issues in flow; improvements feed straight into the pipeline. Fixes in days or weeks, not months or release cycles. That’s PLG, the way it should be. Super excited for what’s next, and incredibly grateful to our earliest customers for seeing (and shaping) what’s possible. We are live, this is real, and we are scaling a digital workforce for credit. And it makes me realize, Agentic is the new paradigm for software and product led growth. #AI #Agentic #Fintech #Lending #PLG #Automation #TimeToValue

76

3 Comments

What's the MACH Alliance for? It's a question I've been asked a great deal and to take it back to first principals it was to promote architectures (unashamedly technical) to support customer choice, excellent user experience and interoperability between best of breed vendors. Has that worked? That's a debate that can last hours - the good MACH projects, the ones on stage at the various MACH events show that it absolutely can work. Have there been horror stories - of course, plus ça change in IT. However, one thing that has been announced and now released is the MACH Common Data Model. Search my LinkedIn and you'll find a link to a (now unavailable) blog I wrote in 2019 (I think; Stacey Trimnell-Ritchard remembers it I hope as she said she used it in a marketing conversation back then so it did happen 🤣) calling for this and so it's brilliant to see it now exists: https://lnkd.in/eTFVgYKX What is it? In their own words: "The MACH Alliance Open Data Model (ODM) initiative is the natural next step in enabling interoperability across composable ecosystems. It serves as a semantic interoperability layer: a "Rosetta Stone" for understanding how to translate data between systems in hybrid commerce architectures. It provides canonical reference models and implementation guidance that enable architects to design effective data integration across commerce platforms while preparing organizations for AI-powered ecosystems." I'm interested and signed up and I know we're looking at how we can incorporate the ideas into Patchworks (the platform already supports this of course and it will help our AI mapping tools no end). Find out more by attending MACH X in October: https://lnkd.in/epHx2JVp

42

3 Comments