The AI revolution may be grabbing the headlines, but behind every breakthrough sits a growing network of physical infrastructure. From data centers and energy networks to recycling facilities and solar technology, the digital economy is built on far more than software. It also relies on the efforts of hardware entrepreneurs.

However, building and scaling the companies that supply this infrastructure is far from simple. OECD data shows fewer than 1% of SMEs in developed economies ever grow into large enterprises. Even among high-growth firms, most slow sharply after their initial expansion. The ScaleUp Institute reports that while the U.K. alone counts more than 30,000 scale-ups, only a small fraction of them turn rapid revenue growth into lasting resilience.

For businesses selling physical products , the challenge is steeper still. Unlike digital or service-led firms, they must scale teams and markets alongside complex supply chains, quality assurance and capital-heavy operations, all while keeping pace with rising global demand.

Waste Intelligence Is The New Digital Economy

The biggest inefficiencies today lie not in software but in physical systems that have never been fully digitized. That’s the view of Ambarish Mitra, cofounder of London-based Greyparrot . “Waste is inherently physical,” he says. “Materials move on real conveyor belts. They are sorted by real machinery. They end up in real supply chains, or they don’t.”

Greyparrot’s solution is the Analyzer, a compact, AI-enabled hardware unit mounted above conveyor belts in recycling plants. It captures real-time data, turning physical activity into actionable intelligence. “It is physical infrastructure that underpins a new digital economy that we call waste intelligence,” adds Mitra.

Unlocking Critical Insights

Rather than forcing operators to rebuild facilities, Greyparrot designed its technology to fit existing workflows. The technology proves itself by unlocking critical insights into throughput, plant availability, contamination rates, and material recovery. “Once operators have the data, it becomes part of how they make decisions every day,” says Mitra. “Then scaling becomes a very different conversation.”

With more than 250 units deployed across 20 countries, customers have seen tangible gains. One site reduced aluminum losses by 58%, while another cut losses of PET, cardboard and paper by 32–42%. Demonstrating and communicating that value to others has been key to the company’s ability to scale.

“Greyparrot is the visibility and intelligence layer that makes better recovery possible,” says Mitra. “The data exists. The infrastructure exists. We’re connecting the two. The nations and businesses that understand this will build more resilient supply chains and power more of their own economic growth from materials they already have.”

Connecting Electrification And Digitalization

Critical to connecting control systems, power systems, equipment and infrastructure, is the cable sector. Founded in 1975, Eland Cables spent its first 25 years as a small but quality-focused supplier of power, data and control cables, products that now sit at the heart of electrification and digitalization. Today, its components connect wind turbines, data centers, stadium lighting and ship systems worldwide.

Acquired by a multinational group in 1997, the business saw little growth and remained at single-digit million revenues by the early 2000s. The turning point came with a management buyout in 2006. JS Pelland, who advised on the deal, joined as CFO and coowner in 2008.

“Eland Cables had all the ingredients for long-term success,” he says. “The tenacity of a startup, a charismatic leader who was obsessively customer-focused, and exposure to macro trends like electrification and digitalization.”

With a background in corporate finance, Pelland brought the governance and structure needed to advance growth. Between the buyout and 2025, Eland delivered a compound annual growth rate of 15%, reaching €365 million in annual sales, a trajectory he describes as ‘structured evolution rather than dramatic reinvention’.

Many of the company’s strengths date to its early years. He says: “My role is to translate that original vision into clear objectives and actionable plans that are aspirational yet realistic, and rally the company behind them.

Quality Infrastructure Is Key To Sustained Scale

A defining milestone came in 2015 with the creation of The Cable Lab, Eland Cables’ ISO/IEC 17025 and IECEE CBTL-accredited testing facility. Pelland sees it as a natural progression. “The Cable Lab wasn’t about changing who we were. It was about building the technical and quality infrastructure needed for sustained scale. You cannot grow internationally without demonstrable, reliable standards.”

This shift from founder-led quality to institutionalized quality marked a critical step in the company’s evolution. Eland Cables’ story shows that scaling to enterprise level is less about reinvention and more about structured evolution.

On the transition from SME to enterprise, Pelland is clear. “It goes beyond structure and process,” he says. “While governance is essential, maintaining an entrepreneurial, can-do culture is critical to sustained success.”

Transforming The Solar Panel Sector

Solar energy is central to the global clean transition, but traditional silicon panels are approaching their practical efficiency and cost limits. Perovskite-silicon tandem technology promises to unlock the next leap forward, and Oxford PV , a University of Oxford spin-out founded in 2010, is leading the field with more than 400 granted foundational patents.

“Once silicon became the dominant material for solar, the industry began to identify novel materials in an effort to overcome silicon’s inherent efficiency limits and bring down the cost of energy,” says CEO David Ward. “That triggered our initial interest to explore perovskite’s value.”

Tandem cells combine silicon with a thin perovskite layer to capture more of the solar spectrum, delivering significantly higher efficiency from the same surface area. This directly lowers the cost of electricity by increasing output and yield.

Moving from lab research to industrial production remains the greatest hurdle for hardware innovation. Oxford PV operates an R&D hub in Oxford and a manufacturing facility in Brandenburg, Germany.

Scaling Up Via A Licensing Strategy

“Our approach to scale is driven by a clear mission to make perovskite PV technology mainstream,” Ward says. “We recognize that this transition cannot be achieved by a single company acting alone. So, to enable scale at pace, we have built a hybrid business model that combines our own manufacturing with a licensing strategy underpinned by our foundational intellectual property in perovskite photovoltaics.”

Licensing allows established solar manufacturers to adopt and scale the technology quickly, while Oxford PV continues to refine its own commercial product line. Its factory in Brandenburg signaled a shift from lab-scale devices to the production of full-size commercial products, both cells and modules. “As our innovation and technology advances, we’re proving that tandem technology can be manufactured at an industrial scale with the reliability required for global deployment,” says Ward.

With energy demand rising sharply due to electrification, AI and data infrastructure, efficiency gains matter more than ever.

“Solar is already the lowest-cost source of electricity, but further reductions now depend on higher efficiency,” adds Ward. “Perovskite-silicon tandem technology will herald a new era of high-efficiency solar that can better support energy requirements. By bringing tandem solar to commercial scale, we’re enabling a new generation of high-efficiency, space-efficient energy systems that will underpin the global transition to clean electricity.”

As AI, electrification and digital infrastructure continue to expand, the hardware entrepreneurs building the physical systems behind them may prove just as important as the software companies attracting the headlines.