About Nightingale HQ

Our Mission

To revolutionise productivity in metals manufacturing by making advanced tools and insights available to everyone.

What we stand for

• We believe the best results come from combining smart tools with human expertise.
• We believe in building long-term partnerships with our customers based on trust, transparency and shared success.
• We believe in continuous learning and improvement, both for ourselves and our customers.
• We believe in making a positive impact on the environment and society through our work.

How we’re achieving this

We’ve built GoSmarter, an AI production assistant for metals manufacturers that helps people save time and reduce waste.

The Founders

Steph Locke is an ex-Microsoft leader in Digital Innovation and AI focused on Industrial organisations. With expertise in both the technical and the change management aspects of AI implementation, she regularly presents and keynotes globally on the topics of AI, Data Science, and the integration of these capabilities into business. She was named one of the UK’s most Inspiring Women in Manufacturing and was Chair of the European DIGITAL SME Alliance AI Focus Group’s Steering Committee.

Ruth Kearney has a background in marketing and sales and over 15 years’ experience delivering innovation and digitalisation programmes with industry. More recently, she has worked with Trinity College Dublin and Talent Garden. She lead the launch of a range of Data and AI Readiness programmes for the corporate market. Ruth also has a strong track record in building cross-sector collaborations and has secured millions of euros in exchequer and EU funding for innovation projects.

Find out more about the team on our dedicated Team page.

Our Story

Founded in late 2018, GoSmarter was created to help businesses truly harness data science and AI. Co-founders Ruth and Steph first met while delivering AI Readiness and Data Science Bootcamps for global brands including Google, Novartis, CRH, and a range of public sector and financial institutions. Their early work focused on helping Irish manufacturers become “AI ready” through government part-funded Digital Reviews that assessed processes and technology delivering actionable digitalisation roadmaps.

Frustrated by how slowly many organisations adopted new tools, they built the first version of GoSmarter — a platform offering practical, ready-to-use AI solutions for small and medium manufacturers. While early to market, this work laid the foundation for today’s GoSmarter: a single, easy-to-use platform purpose-built for metals manufacturers.

During COVID-19, Ruth and Steph focused on building and connecting. They launched the AI Fights Back webinar series, delivering 16 weeks of practical insights into real manufacturing challenges, and partnered with Helmholtz, the German National Centre for Infection Control, to create a global data-sharing platform for COVID research.

These experiences provided a deep, ground-level understanding of manufacturing, its day-to-day operations, pain-points and opportunities. That insight continues to drive GoSmarter’s mission to co-develop with metals manufacturers and deliver tools that add real value, quickly and effectively.

Why Nightingale HQ?

Most people know Florence Nightingale as the Lady with the Lamp, but few realise she was also one of the world’s first and most effective data scientists. During the Crimean War, she used rigorous analysis of sanitation and medical care to transform patient outcomes and save thousands of lives. Rather than publishing for academics, Florence presented her findings in clear, practical ways that government and military leaders could act on immediately. Turning complex, real-world data into simple, actionable insight had a profound impact and it’s the same approach we strive for today. Our name reflects that aspiration and serves as a constant reminder of it.

Award Winning Innovation

• Best Greentech Application - Wales Technology Awards 2025
• Innovate UK Innovation Awardee
• The Vanguard Initiative VInnovate Awardee
• EIT Manufacturing Innovation Awardee
• EIT Manufacturing Education Awardee

Partners

We partner with world-leading organisations to advance our research and development.

Join our team

Interested in joining a hard working, diverse and creative scaleup? Drop us a line jobs@nightingalehq.ai