Sayari Illuminate × UK Government Community Meet Up
Practitioners and leaders. Tradecraft and intelligence. Off the record.
An invitation-only gathering for practitioners and leaders from across UK government and industry to discuss collaboration, tradecraft intelligence, and practical strategies for combating serious organised crime and national security threats.
Registration is now closed
The registration period for this event has closed. If you believe you should have received confirmation, or have a question about attendance, please contact the events team.
Questions? Contact [email protected]
To enable candid discussion, this event is closed to press and social media.
- No recordings or photos.
- Chatham House Rule applies. Information may be used freely; contact details are not shared without permission.
- Attendance limited to UK Government officials and industry professionals.
About the Briefing
Bringing UK government and industry together to operate against serious threats
Serious and organised crime, illicit finance networks, and threats to national security increasingly cross jurisdictions and sectors. The practitioners working these problems sit in different agencies, departments, and private companies, and they rarely have the room to compare notes candidly.
This meet up brings together a small group of senior operators from across UK government and industry to discuss what is actually working, what is not, and where commercial intelligence and modern data tradecraft can move investigations and risk programmes forward.
The format is structured for honest exchange: peer presentations, working discussion, and dedicated time to make the connections that turn into follow-on work back at the desk.
Date
Monday, 1 June 2026
Full agenda confirmed in the week prior
Venue
ADS Group Limited
Salamanca Square, 9 Albert Embankment, London SE1 7SP
Format
Peer presentations · Working discussion · Networking
Audience
UK government officials & vetted industry partners
Programme & Speakers
A short, focused day with practitioner-led sessions
Kevin Newe
Head of Financial Crime Threats
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC)
Kevin is an internationally recognised expert in illicit finance with more than 18 years’ experience leading strategic and operational responses to financial crime, making him a sought-after voice on high-impact financial crime issues.
His expertise centres on identifying and disrupting complex laundering methodologies, including the misuse of corporate structures, professional enabler facilitation, cross-border value transfer schemes, and the integration of criminal proceeds through traditional and emerging financial channels.
In his current role, Kevin directs HMRC’s strategic approach to priority financial crime threats and helps shape national enforcement and intelligence strategies. As a Financial Action Task Force (FATF) assessor, he contributes to global evaluations of compliance with international standards, including the UAE’s Mutual Evaluation Review.
Kevin’s impact has been recognised with the 2022 Keith Hughes Award for Excellence and Innovation in Financial Investigation and a 2025 World Customs Organization Merit Certificate for advancing international collaboration against illicit finance.
Adrian Searle
Senior Associate Fellow
Royal United Services Institute (RUSI)
Former Director, NECC & UKFIU (National Crime Agency)
Adrian is a Senior Associate Fellow at RUSI and board advisor. His areas of expertise are illicit trade, trafficking, illicit financial flows and anti-money laundering policy.
He was formerly Director of the National Economic Crime Centre (NECC) and the UK Financial Intelligence Unit (UKFIU). These are housed in the National Crime Agency. Adrian was responsible for leading the UK’s operational response to fraud and wider economic crime.
During his time at the NECC Adrian directed a world leading data sharing partnership with UK banks, initiated the NCA’s largest ever operation countering global money laundering, and worked with the technology sector to counter scam centre activity in South East Asia.
Natasha Edwards
Solutions Analyst
Sayari Government Team
Natasha Edwards is a Solutions Analyst on Sayari’s Government Team, leading the company’s investigative work into Chinese organised crime and investment fraud operations. She has ten years’ experience in OSINF for public sector decision making, with previous roles held in Intelligence Analysis and Product Management. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Chinese Studies.
Additional speakers will be published in the weeks ahead.
Registered attendees will receive the final speaker list and any agenda updates by email in the week before the event.
Featured Sessions & Keynote Panels
Four sessions on the operational frontier
Data Insights: The Social Impact of Economic & Organised Crime
A walkthrough of the downstream human cost of financial crime, and how regulators and the private sector are evolving their collaboration to combat the way serious organised crime infiltrates and degrades society.
Deep Dive
Latest findings from the Chinese Money Laundering White Paper. How HMG can create and maintain an environment unattractive to CMLOs and OCGs in illicit finance.
Featured Contributors
- Kevin Newe Head of Financial Crime Threats, HMRC
- National Crime Agency speaker to be confirmed
- Adrian Searle former Director, National Economic Crime Centre (NECC) & UK Financial Intelligence Unit (UKFIU)
- Simon York Sayari · former Director, HMRC Risk and Intelligence Service
- Moderated by Evan Lehner Public Safety Lead, Sayari UK
Uncovering Adversarial Influence in UK Supply Chains & Critical National Infrastructure
Adversary states exploit opaque ownership and hidden sub-tier dependencies to compromise UK supply chains and infrastructure. This session shows how Sayari automates sub-tier mapping, surfaces Foreign Ownership, Control and Influence (FOCI), and enables continuous monitoring that replaces the blind spots of point-in-time assessments.
Live Case Studies
What adversarial presence looks like in practice, and what it takes to find it across complex corporate structures and material dependencies sourced from adversarial states.
Featured Contributors
- Drawn from the Sayari UK government and analyst team
Tradecraft Masterclass on Sayari Organised Crime
A practitioner-led walkthrough of the complexities of conducting due diligence in high-risk jurisdictions. How to maintain supply chain and counterparty integrity when the actors involved are actively obfuscating their footprints.
Tradecraft Focus
Entity and network analysis techniques, hands-on examples from active investigations, and lessons learned from countering state threats against UK and European supply chains and critical national infrastructure.
Featured Contributors
- Sayari practitioner team, with confirmed government and law-enforcement contributors
Scaling Investigations with Responsible AI
How Sayari is operationalising responsible AI inside the investigative workflow, scaling analyst capacity without compromising provenance, judgement, or explainability. A practical view of the guardrails, evaluation methods, and human-in-the-loop checkpoints that make AI usable for government investigations.
What You Will See
Live demonstrations of Graph AI automating link discovery on real network problems, a look at the Sayari Pilot environment built for large-scale network illumination, and the safeguards that make AI defensible in a government context.
Featured Contributors
- Will Bell Solutions Director, Global Government BU, Sayari
Provisional Agenda
A short, focused day · 1 June 2026
Arrival & Registration
Welcome Remarks
The Rise and Rise of Chinese Money Laundering Organisations · UK Threat Assessment
Data Insights: The Social Impact of Economic and Organised Crime
How does HMG create and maintain an environment that is unattractive to CMLOs and OCGs in illicit finance?
Tradecraft Masterclass on Sayari Organised Crime
Uncovering Adversarial Influence in UK Supply Chains and Critical National Infrastructure
Live case studies on FOCI, sub-tier mapping, and continuous monitoring across complex corporate structures and adversarial-state material dependencies.
Scaling Investigations with Responsible AI
Closing Remarks
Networking at The Rose
35 Albert Embankment, London SE1 7TL · a short walk from the venue
Provisional · subject to refinement in the weeks ahead. Registered attendees will receive the final agenda by email in the week before the event.
Who Should Attend
Built for practitioners working at the edge of the problem
National security & intelligence
Officers and analysts working serious organised crime, threat finance, sanctions, and adjacent national security mandates inside HMG departments and agencies.
Law enforcement & regulatory
Investigators and policy leads from UK law enforcement, financial crime regulators, and the bodies responsible for enforcement of the UK’s economic crime regime.
Industry partners
Senior risk, compliance, and intelligence leaders from companies that work alongside UK government on supply chain integrity, sanctions, and illicit finance.
Venue
ADS Group, Salamanca Square, London
ADS Group Limited
Salamanca Square
9 Albert Embankment
London SE1 7SP
United Kingdom
Access & logistics
Salamanca Square sits on the South Bank, a short walk from Vauxhall and Lambeth North stations. Confirmed attendees will receive venue access details, security requirements, and arrival instructions in their confirmation email closer to the date.
See you at Salamanca Square
Registration is closed. Confirmed attendees will receive final agenda and venue access details by email before the event.