If you’d asked us two years ago what the hardest part of building Innate Needs would be, we’d probably have guessed the mapping, the technical groundwork, or the sheer scale of pulling thousands of support services into something clear and useful. What we definitely wouldn’t have predicted was the resistance.
Not from individuals. Not from small organisations. Not from frontline workers. They’ve been some of our biggest supporters. They see instantly what the platform can do because they’ve lived with this fragmented system for years, often carrying the burden of helping people navigate it.
The resistance has come from places we genuinely didn’t expect.
You’d assume everyone ultimately wants the same outcome: a country where support is visible, coordinated, and easy to access. A system where people aren’t left searching through outdated websites and inconsistent information. You’d imagine that when something appears that can genuinely fix part of this, the natural response would be, “Great - how do we work together?”
But that’s not what’s happened.
When Collaboration Doesn’t Quite Happen
Over the last few months, we’ve had more meetings than we can count - calls, introductions, follow-ups. And almost every time, the pattern is the same.
People love the vision. They agree the current system doesn’t work. They recognise that individuals are left chasing information that should be centralised, and that frontline staff waste too much time cross-checking sources.
But when it comes to sharing data or working openly, suddenly things tighten. Data becomes territorial. Listings become assets. Even when the information is already public, making it visible through a national tool raises concerns about control.
You can almost hear the unspoken question: “If we share this, what do we lose?”
Meanwhile, the people actually needing support face the consequences - parents juggling impossible schedules, older adults looking for companionship, individuals dealing with crisis, care workers trying to help someone in minutes, and councils buried in enquiries. The system’s fragmentation creates real-world strain: missed help, wasted journeys, wrong referrals, unnecessary stress.
The frustrating part? These problems are all solvable - if the system worked together.
Why We Had to Rethink the Whole Approach
At some point, we realised we couldn’t build a reliable national platform while relying on manual updates or goodwill alone. As much as we want collaboration, we needed a way to keep the data accurate without depending on organisations who, understandably or not, hesitate to share it.
That’s how Innate AI came to life.
It wasn’t the route we planned. We would much rather have built this hand-in-hand with every national network, council, and charity. But when collaboration stalls, progress musn’t.
Introducing Innate AI
Innate AI solves the biggest practical challenge we faced: keeping thousands of listings up to date at scale.
Instead of asking overstretched organisations to manually update another system, we now monitor changes at source.
If an organisation updates its website - opening hours, referral steps, phone numbers, eligibility - that change is automatically picked up and reflected on Innate Needs.
No missed updates.
No outdated listings.
No extra admin.
No chasing.
Just the most accurate data possible, maintained without extra effort for the organisations themselves.
A Solution Born From Frustration - But Built For People
Let’s be honest: we didn’t build Innate AI because organisations wouldn’t cooperate. We built it because people need a reliable way to find help - and we weren’t willing to let structural barriers stop that.
If anything, the resistance confirmed why Innate Needs needs to exist. If the system is this protective of information that should be easy to access, the problem goes deeper than we thought.
People don’t care who “owns” the data.
They care about finding help, quickly and without stress.
Innate Needs is built for them. Innate AI is built for them.
Still Open to Collaboration
None of this means we’ve closed the door on partnership. We’d welcome collaboration with any organisation that believes support should be accessible and user-focused. But we’re no longer waiting for it to move forward.
The individuals searching for support can’t wait.
The frontline teams can’t wait.
The councils trying to help residents can’t wait.
So we’re moving - with or without collaboration.
Final Thought
Most organisations genuinely want to help the people who rely on them. But wanting something and enabling it are not the same thing. When systems prioritise protecting information over sharing it, people are left navigating a maze that shouldn’t exist.
Innate AI is our commitment to bridge those gaps ourselves - because no one looking for help should have to care about who holds which piece of data. They just need the right information at the right time. And we’re going to make sure they get it.
