ABOUT
Our Mission.
The same gap, opening far earlier.
the story
DEfactoED was founded to close the distance between what education produces and what the world of work actually requires.
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We began with digital transformation education for organisations - helping leaders and workforces understand technology they hadn’t been trained for. The same gap, we came to realise, was opening far earlier and far wider in schools.
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LIGHTBULB is our response. It has grown from a programme delivered out of our Bangalore office into a structured seven-year pathway now running in schools across the UK, India and wider Asia.
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The conviction behind it hasn’t changed: academic achievement matters, but on its own it is no longer enough.
how we work
Three Principles.
Designed by practioners
LIGHTBULB was built by senior business leaders who have hired, managed and developed people - not by curriculum theorists. The content reflects what employers actually look for.
Built with specialists
We don’t invent our own competency model. LIGHTBULB 2.0 supports the Beyond Education framework, built by one of the world’s leading competency development organisations, so that what we measure is externally defined rather than marked by us.
Delivered through schools
We don’t bypass teachers. Every element is designed to be delivered by classroom staff, with the resources to make that straightforward.
People who have run businesses, not written curricula.
the team
David Knight
chairman & director of innovation
Co-founder of DEfactoED. David spent the larger part of his earlier career as a Partner at PwC, specialising in business and organisational change, and has since worked with public and private sector organisations across the world on digital capability. LIGHTBULB came out of a simple observation: the skills gap he was closing for adult workforces was opening far earlier, and far wider, in schools.
Tim Field
director of clients & markets
Co-founder, and the person from whom DEfactoED originated. Tim was an EY Partner and held senior executive roles at Anglo American plc, where he led global transformation programmes. He focuses on how our products reach schools and translate into real value for them - and on the part most change programmes get wrong, which is bringing people with you.
Dr Mark Seneschall
director of content & curation
Mark leads research and content design across the LIGHTBULB curriculum. He is the author of The Anatomy of IT Projects: Why They’re Hard and Why They Fail, and brings more than thirty years of business experience - the majority of it at BP, in senior business and transformation roles.
Professor Alan Brown
professor in digital economy, university of exeter
Alan is Professor in Digital Economy at Exeter Business School and one of the UK’s most widely followed voices on digital change. He is the author of six books, most recently Making AI Work for Britain: From Strategies to Practice (2026), which argues that Britain’s AI challenge is institutional rather than technological, and Surviving and Thriving in the Age of AI (2024).
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He is Research Director at the Digital Policy Alliance and AI Director at the Digital Leaders Network, and was previously an IBM Distinguished Engineer and European CTO for IBM’s software group. He is a Fellow of the British Computer Society and was a Fellow of the Alan Turing Institute. His argument - that value comes from judgement and adaptability rather than from the tools alone - underpins how the Digital & AI Literacy stream is framed.
Supriyo Guha Roy
national associate, defactoed india
Supriyo brings extensive business management experience to DEfactoED, built through senior roles across a range of commercial operations. He later moved into education, working widely across K-12, higher education and universities, including as CEO of a leading education group based in Bengaluru.
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As National Advisor for India, he leads customer engagement and oversees deployment of the LIGHTBULB programme, managing the relationships with school leaders that determine whether a partnership succeeds.
Madhan MR
country manager, defactoed india
Madhan leads DEfactoED in India and is a Director of the Indian subsidiary. An educationalist and entrepreneur with close to two decades in the sector across the Indian subcontinent, he has driven LIGHTBULB’s growth from the Bangalore office into schools nationally.
Ritika Subhash
national associate, defactoed india
Ritika is an educationist, entrepreneur and child-development advocate who has spent her career working at the intersection of children, schools, educators and technology. She has partnered with 300+ schools, trained thousands of educators and parents, and worked across education technology, school partnerships and child development. She is also an author of five children's books and the host of the international parenting podcast Parenting Truth & Dare.
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As LIGHTBULB's India Growth Partner, Ritika works with international schools to explore how student development can move beyond academic achievement towards the capabilities, confidence and agency young people need to navigate an increasingly complex world.
Our partners
BGS Group of Schools - Bangalore • DSB International School - Mumbai • COBIS • UK Register of Learning Providers - UKPRN 10091466 •