Sam Blakeman · AI² · UK customs
AI + customs, shipped DDP.
Lead the team behind CAT360. Live, operational, paying clients. Not a pitch deck.
Thousands of AI experts don't know customs. Hundreds of customs experts treat AI as a rumour. A handful of us live in the overlap. Fewer still run something in production.
Currently
Head of Customs Analytics, Barbourne Brook.
I run the team behind CAT360, an operational AI + customs product with paying clients. Not a deck. Not a pilot. A live service.
The frame I work to is AI²: Artificial Intelligence plus Applied Intelligence. AI scales what seasoned customs experts already know. Humans bring judgement, liability, and trust. AI without experts is a risk. Experts without AI is a cost.
I'm also comfortably bald, occasionally write under the banner Viberpsychosis, and have a suspicious number of opinions about commodity codes.
Projects
Things that exist because I built them.
- Live with clients
Flagship · Barbourne Brook
CAT360
An operational AI + UK customs product. Turns HMRC data and trader filings into usable intelligence. The thing most of this website is about.
cat360.io → - Live
Side project · Running
LL50
Pace calculator for the Lakeland 50 and 100 ultramarathons. Enter a flat pace, get a checkpoint schedule adjusted for the climbing you are about to meet. Kit list included, because you forgot yours.
ll50.samblakeman.com → - Ongoing
Writing
Viberpsychosis
Essays and notes from building AI things for real money. Named after the condition of staring at a Cursor diff at 1am and feeling alive.
viberpsychosis.com → - Live
Product · Dev tools
Quiver
A local web UI for managing Claude Code skills and marketplace plugins. Browse, install, edit, sync across machines. Built because opening a terminal to manage a skill called "docx" felt absurd.
skillquiver.com →
Writing
Notes from shipping.
Media & speaking
Occasionally let out in public.
Webinars, panels, articles, the odd reader photo gallery. Updated as things happen, not as things are promised.
Running a podcast, conference, or trade-body session? Get in touch.
- Writing
TRE Makes Customs Data Free: The Next Step in Customs Data Transparency
CAT360 blog
Why HMRC finally removing the paywall on customs data matters, and what traders should do with the access.
- Webinar
The Trade Reporting & Extracting (TRE) Service and How Your Business Can Benefit
CAT360 webinar series
A walk-through of HMRC's new TRE service, what it makes available, and what that unlocks for traders.
- Award
Customs Technology Company of the Year, Finalist
Multimodal Awards · NEC Birmingham
Barbourne Brook / CAT360 named among the finalists in the Customs Technology category at the Multimodal Awards.
- Speaking
Digitalisation of International Trade and Transport
Multimodal 2023 · NEC Birmingham
Panellist alongside Maersk, WiseTech Global, and CNS, chaired by James Hookham (Global Shippers Forum). I was there as the customs voice, representing Customs4trade at the time.
- Webinar
The CDS deadline for exporters: how you can start to prepare now
Institute of Export & International Trade
Co-hosted with Matt Vick (IOE&IT) on the CHIEF to CDS migration. The poll in the room found most UK exporters had not yet started. I argued for testing declarations early. They did not listen at the speed I would have liked.
- Writing
Options for Customs Formalities in the Supply Chain
Customs4Trade blog
Guided tour of the customs options open to UK importers post-Brexit, without the consultancy waffle.
- Press
Happiness is egg-shaped: readers' NFL pictures and stories
The Guardian · GuardianWitness
Two of my photos (49ers at Wembley, a Jaguars fan mid-flag-wave) and a quote about travelling from Wigan to London for NFL games. Entirely unrelated to customs. That is the point.
Get in touch
hello@samblakeman.comBest for: podcast invites, speaking slots, consulting enquiries, people who want to stop paying for three tools that could be one. Worst for: anything that starts with "quick question".