Brandsit

Tag: Business development

  • Creotech and ESA develop CAMILA project – four satellites by 2029

    Creotech and ESA develop CAMILA project – four satellites by 2029

    Creotech Instruments has announced a significant expansion of its collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA) on the CAMILA project – a new addendum raises the value of the contract to more than €59 million, of which €29.1 million will accrue to Creotech alone. This is an increase of around €7.1 million, up from €3.5 million under the previous arrangement.

    A key component of the upgrade is the delivery, launch and commissioning of a fourth observation satellite – the HyperSat Eagle 2.0 platform. The approximately 100 kg design has been equipped with a new orientation control system, larger solar panels and batteries, an open architecture with an interchangeable payload board and an interface to enable in-orbit data processing using artificial intelligence. With this, Eagle 2.0 is set to become a fully multi-mission platform – the identical satellite core already supports different missions with different payloads in parallel.

    The second pillar of the annex is the integration of services of the commercial ground station network providing global connectivity, improving mission management and data transmission. Consequently, the contract provides for an updated schedule and new milestones. Creotech’s commitments at CAMILA are expected to be completed by November 2029 at the latest, although the company does not rule out further extensions.

    CAMILA (Country Awareness Mission in Land Analysis) is a programme comprising four observation satellites and a ground segment for control and data processing – with maximum participation of Polish technology. Creotech functions here as the main contractor. The project is part of the country’s and ESA’s broader strategy to build European technology chains in the space sector. An earlier contract from April 2025 was worth nearly €52 million – with three satellites and ground infrastructure.

    The contract extension signals Poland’s growing importance in the European space sector – while also testing the maturity of HyperSat’s technology and Creotech’s ability to carry out large-scale, complex missions at the first-tier integrator level.

  • Promotion without preparation. What happens when a great specialist becomes a poor leader

    Promotion without preparation. What happens when a great specialist becomes a poor leader

    In technology companies, this is a familiar and frequent scenario: a capable engineer, architect or consultant, after a few years of good work, is promoted to team leader.

    On the surface, everything seems to fit – he has knowledge, experience and authority among his colleagues. Yet after a few months something starts to go wrong.

    Team effectiveness declines. There is tension in communication. Initiative wanes. And no one can clearly pinpoint the cause. Only that it has already happened – on promotion day.

    When an expert becomes a manager

    In IT companies, promotion is often a reward for operational efficiency. The person who is commanding, knows the product inside out, can ‘put out fires’ and has high technical credibility is automatically put on the managerial track. The change in role seems logical – until it clashes with reality.

    The problem starts when the new leader tries to continue acting like an expert. He still makes most decisions. He still solves problems on his own. Still knows the tools and technologies best.

    All of this is starting to become a bottleneck. The team, instead of growing, is starting to run circles around him.

    Added to this is the natural difficulty of moving from ‘I do alone’ to ‘I support others’ mode. Managing requires a completely different set of competences: talking, delegating, building autonomy, managing emotions and sometimes stepping back from being the number one expert. It’s a change not only functionally, but also mentally. And few are prepared for this role.

    The team feels this first

    The effects of a leader’s failed promotion are usually felt most quickly by the team. Employees lose their sense of influence because decisions are made over their heads or are ‘corrected’ by the boss. Feedback loses its importance because it is clear that the last word belongs to one person anyway. Meetings become one-sided and initiative gradually dies out.

    Moreover, the leader himself is also often not comfortable in his new role. He or she has more responsibilities, less time to do the things he or she enjoys, more responsibility and less clear criteria for success.

    In addition, there is no one to go to for support because no one has previously defined what a leadership role actually is in this company.

    The result is frustration on both sides – only that no one speaks out about it. And yet the problem is not due to a lack of technical competence. On the contrary, it is their excess in the wrong place that becomes a problem.

    Not everyone needs to manage to grow

    Many partner companies do not have an alternative development path for experts who do not want or need to manage people. When ‘leadership’ is the only option for development, the organisation inadvertently pushes experts out of the roles they excel at into roles that burn them out – and cost the team far more than they realise.

    The solution is not to abandon promotions. It is to consciously introduce a parallel expert path – one that gives prestige, real influence on technical decisions, access to strategic projects, while not forcing you to be a superior.

    Such a path is already in place in larger organisations (e.g. Principal Engineer, Staff Architect), but it is also increasingly being implemented by dynamic MSPs and integrators.

    This allows technical people to develop in what they do best – and the organisation does not lose key operational competencies.

    When promotion makes sense – how to prepare for it

    Of course, there are situations where it makes sense for an expert to move into a leadership role. But preparation is key. Before someone becomes formally a manager, it’s worth giving them a chance to test themselves in a smaller role: as a project leader, a mentor to junior staff, someone leading a retrospective or team meetings.

    This allows you to test not only skills but also motivation. Does the person really want to manage? Does he or she derive satisfaction from working with people rather than solving technical problems? Is he or she able to listen, take feedback, delegate tasks?

    It is also worth communicating clearly that promotion is not a merit award. It is a change of function – and a new set of expectations. Without this, any change of role becomes a lottery, with the motivation of the whole team at stake.

    Leader is not another level of difficulty – it’s a different game

    In technology companies, it is still too often assumed that development means moving into management. Meanwhile, an effective organisation needs both great specialists and informed leaders – but not necessarily in the same person.

    A team with an unprepared manager may still ‘run on the engine’ of a good atmosphere and past successes for a while. But over time it will start to stagnate, avoid risks, lose momentum.

    Therefore, before someone is promoted, it is worth asking one simple question: does he or she want to lead people – or has no one just shown him or her another way?


  • AI FOMO: Why are companies investing in AI out of fear rather than strategy?

    AI FOMO: Why are companies investing in AI out of fear rather than strategy?

    The current situation in the artificial intelligence market resembles a gold rush. Everyone feels that a huge opportunity is waiting on the horizon and the train to the future is just leaving the station. There is a rush in boardrooms and board meetings just to get a seat on it.

    The question is: is this momentum driven by a considered strategy or is it driven by a panicky fear of being left behind? Unfortunately, more and more data points to the latter. This phenomenon, referred to as AI FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out), is becoming a silent killer of budgets and innovation.

    Diagnosis of the phenomenon: ‘Defence’ investment is not a strategy

    In an ideal world, every decision to implement a new technology would be preceded by an in-depth analysis. The team identifies the problem, looks for the best solution and then implements it, measuring specific success metrics. The reality of the AI era, however, is different.

    A worrying picture emerges from the latest European market research, conducted by the ESSCA Management School’s AI Sustainability Institute. It turns out that only one in four companies (23%) are implementing AI in response to a clearly identified, pre-existing need.

    What motivates the others? As many as six out of ten organisations admit that they invest for what could be called ‘defensive’ reasons – not to lose competitive advantage and ‘not to miss the train’ – or under vague suggestions from the board or external consultants.

    This is a classic example of technology looking for a problem to solve, rather than the other way around. This approach leads to ghost projects: costly, without clear objectives (KPIs) and without a defined return on investment (ROI).

    It is action for action’s sake, which at best ends up creating a tool that is of little use, and at worst wastes resources that could have been spent on real innovation.

    Scale matters: Who is most feared and why?

    Interestingly, AI FOMO syndrome has different facets depending on the size of the company.

    Large corporations often fall victim to image pressure. Management, bombarded by headlines about the AI revolution, feels the need to act to show shareholders and the market that the company is modern.

    This leads to ‘innovation theatre’ – projects that look great on slides in a presentation, but add no value in practice.

    Medium-sized companies seem to be the voice of reason. Operating with limited resources, they cannot afford to experiment aimlessly.

    Therefore, their investments in AI are much more often pragmatic and aimed at solving specific pain points – optimising logistics, automating customer service or streamlining production processes.

    Small and micro companies are at the other extreme. For them, fear leads not to panic but to paralysis. Overwhelmed by costs, lack of expertise and the scale of the challenge, they often give up altogether, which in the long run can prove just as dangerous as their larger competitors burning through their budgets.

    The hidden costs of haste: The risks no one is looking at

    Haste and lack of strategy have another dark side – they lead to ignoring the fundamental risks of artificial intelligence. IT managers focus on problems that have been known for years, such as security and data management, while underestimating completely new risks:

    • Bias: AI learns from the data provided. If the data reflects human stereotypes, the system will uncritically replicate and reinforce them, which can lead to discriminatory decisions in recruitment or credit assessment processes.
    • “Hallucinations: Language models can generate information with absolute certainty that is completely false. Basing key business decisions on such ‘facts’ is a simple path to disaster.
    • Ethical challenges: Who is responsible for an error made by an algorithm? How to ensure transparency in its operation? These are questions that companies need to find answers to.

    These are no longer theoretical considerations. The aforementioned study shows that almost one in five companies (18%) have already had to stop or fundamentally modify an AI project precisely for ethical reasons.

    This is hard evidence that ignoring these aspects generates real costs and risks.

    From fear to strategy: How to board the AI train wisely?

    Artificial intelligence is undoubtedly a transformative technology. However, the key to success is not the mere fact of having it, but how it is used.

    Instead of succumbing to pressure and asking “Should we invest in AI?”, leaders should ask themselves a different, much more important question: “What is our biggest business problem and can AI help solve it?”.

    Changing this perspective is the first step from reactive fear to proactive strategy. Instead of big, vague projects, it makes sense to start with small, well-defined implementations that solve a real problem and deliver measurable benefits.

    It is crucial to think about ethics and risks from the outset, not when the crisis is already knocking at the door.

    It’s not about being on the train to the future at all costs. It’s about knowing where you want to go on it. Otherwise it’s just a very expensive ride in circles.

  • Organisational culture in an IT company – what leaders do, not HR

    Organisational culture in an IT company – what leaders do, not HR

    Trust, responsibility, openness – these are words that are used in all cases in technology companies. They appear on onboarding slides, in internal communications, in presentations to vendors and in job advertisements. But if you ask employees whether they actually see them on a daily basis, the answer is sometimes different.

    In many partner organisations, organisational culture remains a statement. Meanwhile, in practice, something completely different matters: the decisions that leaders make. And not the ones written down in strategy, but the everyday, often unnoticed ones. It is these that build trust or undermine it without saying a word.

    What culture isn’t – and why this can be seen in IT channels

    In partner channel companies – integrators, MSPs, VARs or distributors – the pace of business is high, the complexity of projects is high and teams are often dispersed. This is an environment where organisational culture cannot be something declarative.

    She needs to operate operationally. When this is missing, there is decision-making chaos, inconsistent communication and the phenomenon of ‘formal rules and informal practices’, which begins to break down the team from the inside.

    Leaders often believe that culture is something that needs to be described and communicated – preferably once, properly, in a joint meeting. But the organisation does not remember the presentation.

    The organisation observes everyday life. If the values announced on Monday diverge from the decisions made on Wednesday, the team instantly draws conclusions. Often other than the expected ones.

    How culture is really shaped – in the leader’s decision-making practice

    In reality, culture is not created top-down. It is shaped from the bottom up – through repetition. When an employee sees that an initiative ends in a reprimand, he does not come up with a proposal again. When he observes that mistakes are hidden or punished, he stops admitting failure. And if he sees that promotion depends not on competence but on loyalty, he begins to adapt his behaviour not to expectations but to policy.

    Trust and responsibility – the most frequently repeated buzzwords in IT company culture – are not the result of training. They come from the daily experience of working in a given environment. When a leader says he cares about the team’s autonomy, but approves decisions at every stage of the project, the team learns that autonomy is a fiction.

    When it talks about transparency and then key changes are announced by surprise, it is difficult to expect openness in the other direction.

    Trust is not an emotion. It is the result of consistency

    In partner organisations, trust is not only relational, but also very practical. Sales teams need to trust marketing and presales, and delivery needs to trust project teams and the client. If this doesn’t work, everything goes awry.

    Communication becomes defensive, delegation of responsibility occurs and decisions are delayed for fear of error.

    Trust does not arise because someone has announced it. It arises when people see that an organisation operates according to predictable rules. That mistakes can be reported without fear of consequences. That decisions are made on the basis of facts, not emotions. That a leader sticks to what he or she declares – even when it is difficult.

    In companies where trust is high, teams act faster and take more initiative. Where it is lacking, everything needs to be clarified, consulted, approved and – often – confirmed by email “just in case”.

    Culture is built through decisions, not narratives

    Some partner organisations build a consistent culture not through big programmes, but through very concrete actions. An MSP company that holds a joint problem analysis meeting after every major incident shows that failure is part of the process, not a reason to avoid responsibility.

    An integrator who allows junior staff to lead a pilot project themselves not only builds commitment but also teaches confidence in their own decisions.

    A distributor whose management publicly asks for feedback on the changes made is not only listening, but modelling the behaviour that is then evident in the sales teams.

    These are not employer branding campaigns. These are not organisational culture certificates. These are actions that show people that values are not just words on the wall, but something that realistically affects their daily work.

    The leader as owner of cultural micro-decisions

    Organisational culture is not created in the communication layer. It is created at the operational layer – where decisions are made about promotions, reactions to mistakes, the distribution of responsibility or how meetings are conducted.

    It is the leader – regardless of the level in the structure – who owns this daily life. He can shape it coherently or disperse it haphazardly. He or she can build a climate in which people know what to expect, or an environment in which everyone acts ‘by feel’.

  • Is your team still learning? Stalled development not visible in CRM

    Is your team still learning? Stalled development not visible in CRM

    At first glance, everything is working. The team is delivering sales targets, implementations are completed and calendars are filling up with meetings. But beneath the surface, there is a growing problem that no dashboard shows: the team stops learning.

    It does not happen suddenly. The process is quiet, gradual, often imperceptible. We stop hearing questions in meetings. Feedback goes into a vacuum.

    The same people solve the same problems in the same way. Change creates resistance, not curiosity. And leaders begin to feel that the team is performing – but not growing.

    In the IT channel, where the operational pace is high and projects are complex, a lack of learning is a strategic risk.

    A company that does not develop a team starts to regress – even if it is temporarily growing.

    Why the team stops learning

    Contrary to appearances, it is not a lack of willingness on the part of people. In most cases, the problem is not motivation, but a lack of space. When calendars are filled from morning to evening, there is no time for reflection. And without reflection, there is no learning.

    In many partner companies, leaders unknowingly block team development.

    They are often the experts themselves, who have the answer to every question. When every decision ends with the sentence “let’s do it like last time”, there is no space for experimentation. If an initiative is met with criticism or disregard, it stops.

    Another factor is an excessive focus on operational efficiency.

    When only the quarterly result counts, any activity that does not directly translate into a sales target is considered a waste of time.

    In such an environment, rehearsals, tests, conversations about failures – all seem like a ‘luxury’ that no one can afford.

    And yet it is the failures that are the fuel for learning. A team where nothing ever goes wrong often doesn’t experiment. It works according to plan – even if the plan is from the previous decade.

    What can a leader do to unlock this

    Building a learning culture doesn’t start with a training budget. It starts with a decision that there is room for thinking in this company. And that a leader doesn’t need to know all the answers, but can ask questions that trigger reflection.

    The first step is to change your own behaviour. Instead of giving immediate answers, it is worth starting with: “And how would you solve this?”. Such questions show that it is not just about performance, but about developing competence.

    Another element is to protect the learning space. It is not about designating whole days for training.

    Sometimes an hour a week dedicated to analysing a specific project situation, discussing a mistake together, sharing experiences after implementation is enough. The most important thing is that such time is not put aside ‘for later’.

    It is also worth communicating clearly that non-obvious questions and attempts at new approaches are welcome. And set an example. Talk about what is being taught. To admit when they don’t know something. Share not only successes but also moments of doubt.

    What a team that learns looks like

    Learning teams are recognised not by how often they go to training, but by how they operate on a day-to-day basis. In such teams, feedback comes naturally – not as a mandatory agenda item, but as part of the conversation. Feedback is not seen as a threat, but as a help.

    Team members try their hand at different tasks. Role rotation – even short-term – teaches them to think contextually rather than just operationally. Instead of being locked into their section of responsibility, they understand the whole process.

    After every major project there is a moment for reflection. What worked? What would we have done differently? What is one thing we can improve on before next time? This doesn’t require big meetings or presentations. It is enough that the team knows that such a conversation is important.

    The most thriving teams are those that have permission to take the initiative – and the realisation that not everything has to work the first time.

    Human development, or just numbers?

    In an age of automation, AI and ever-increasing customer expectations, it is not certificates or systems that determine the advantage of an IT partner. What decides is a team that can learn. Not just from books, but from daily work, from conversations, from mistakes.