Holtmere
CV

Woody Holtmere

né Daniel Woodward · Forward Deployed Engineering · Team Lead

UK technology leader in production AI and solution architecture. I lead forward deployed engineering pods that embed with enterprise customers to ship agentic and conversational AI, and I'm happiest when I'm first on the ground: in a new market, a new team, or a customer's hardest problem.

2 FDE pods6+ direct reports
$2–10Mper deal, as technical lead
3× Presidents ClubSprinklr 2017, 2020 · Cognigy 2026

Experience

2025 to now

NiCE Cognigy

Team Lead, UK · Forward Deployed Engineering, NiCE Labs (Jul 2026 to now)

  • Lead two pods with 6+ direct reports; a founding member of the leadership team scaling forward deployed engineering towards 50 people by the end of 2026.
  • Embed with enterprise customers to ship production agentic AI; partner with their CTOs and feed what we learn in deployments back into product and research.
  • Cognigy's first certified Master Builder (Cognigy Mastery Program, issued January 2026): hands-on building alongside leading the team.

Senior Presales Engineer, AI · Nordics Lead (Jan to Jul 2026)

  • Established the Nordics go-to-market and the first land-and-expand opportunities.

Senior Solutions Engineer (Jan 2025 to Jan 2026)

  • First UK presales hire: built an enterprise pipeline from zero and won early deals through multi-agent architectures, technical discovery, workshops and proofs of concept.
2024 to 2025

Apptio, an IBM Company

Senior Solutions Consultant · Agile Transformation Overlay, EMEA

  • The second dedicated Agile overlay in EMEA; developed AI-driven use cases and spoke at partner events on transformation at scale.
2021 to 2024

Quantive (formerly Gtmhub)

Director of Solutions Consulting, then Enterprise Solutions Architect, EMEA and ROW

  • First EMEA and ROW presales hire; grew the team to six, then moved into enterprise architecture to accelerate a new AI and ML platform.
  • Connected engineering and sales through solution design and demo strategy.
2016 to 2020

Sprinklr

Global Strategic Accounts, Solutions Consultant · EMEA Lead

  • First EMEA Solutions Architect, progressing to lead; closed $2–5M opportunities across consumer goods, financial services, automotive and the public sector.
2014 to 2024

Lupine Consulting Ltd

Director and freelance consultant

  • Short freelance assignments between permanent roles in technical presales, product management, CX and broadcast.
Before 2014

Earlier career

Operative · Sintec · Pilat Media · Imagine Communications · Tracx

Expertise

AI and architecture

  • Agentic and conversational AI
  • Multi-agent systems
  • RAG
  • Prompt engineering
  • APIs and integration
  • Voice AI

Enterprise and leadership

  • Discovery
  • Solution architecture
  • Coaching
  • CX and EX
  • Agile at scale

Education and community

First Class BSc (Hons), Animal Behaviour and Welfare, University of Chester, 2008 to 2011
PreSales Collective, member since July 2020

Awards

Presidents Club: Sprinklr (January 2017, February 2020), NiCE Cognigy (January 2026) · Quantive Guiding Principles: "Own It!" (August 2023), "Win as a Team" (February 2023) · Sprinklr: Presales of the Year (January 2016), "Fix It, Don't Complain" (December 2016, global and EMEA), "Never, ever ever ever ever, give up… ever" (May 2019)

Outside work

Travel, zoology, music, brewing, farming, motorbiking and anything outdoors.

Email meLinkedIn