Evidence foundations
Bringing fragmented data and documents together into reliable, well-documented evidence infrastructure that can be stewarded or transferred.
Software for evidence-intensive decisions
Turn messy evidence
into decisions
people can defend.
Orelian builds decision-support software for teams working with complex, unstructured data. Our flagship product, PFD Toolkit, turns thousands of coroners' reports into transparent, research-ready evidence.
Who we help
For organisations making consequential decisions across civil society and public life.
Government departments, public bodies, funders, research organisations and civil society institutions make consequential decisions using evidence spread across administrative systems, accounts, registers, grants, contracts and complex reports. Orelian connects and maintains that evidence so it can be trusted, interrogated and put to work.
Working withGovernment and public bodiesFunders and foundationsResearchersInfrastructure bodiesCharities
Analysis for important decisions
Answering focused questions about need, reach, outcomes, resources and risk, with assumptions and uncertainty made clear.
Decision tools
Turning evidence and analysis into useful workflows, monitoring systems and responsible AI tools that work in practice.
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Structuring messy evidence at scale
Turning inconsistent documents, scans, and free text into reliable data that people can search and analyse.
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Automating evidence workflows responsibly
Replacing repetitive review without losing the source links, audit trail, or human oversight that serious research demands.
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Making AI outputs inspectable
Showing the evidence behind an extraction or classification so users can verify results instead of trusting a black box.
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Finding patterns across thousands of records
Surfacing recurring concerns, organisations, locations, and themes that are difficult to see through manual review alone.
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Moving from prototype to dependable product
Packaging models as maintained web applications and reusable Python tools that work with real users and changing data.
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Supporting reproducible research
Giving researchers consistent workflows, structured exports, and transparent methods they can reuse and scrutinise.
02 Flagship product
Meet our flagship product: PFD Toolkit.
03 Product development
Four steps. No black boxes.
Discover
Map the evidence, user workflow, and constraints before choosing models or writing product code.
Build
Develop the smallest useful product slice, joining data pipelines, models, interfaces, and auditability.
Validate
Test against expert review and real operating conditions, then measure both model quality and user value.
Ship
Release through accessible web interfaces and reusable packages, with documentation and monitoring built in.
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Start with the decision
We design around real users, workflows, and incentives. Products are shaped to work in practice from day one.
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Keep evidence traceable
The best technology is the technology people can use. We do not pick the most advanced option for its own sake.
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Be honest about the limits
We make uncertainty, missing information and competing explanations visible. Sometimes the most useful result is knowing what the available evidence cannot support.
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Test before scaling
We evaluate methods against real examples, measure errors and include proportionate human review. Promising ideas earn further investment through evidence, not enthusiasm.
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Build for continuity
Everything we ship is designed for the people who will use it on Monday morning, not just the people who see the demo on Friday.
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Build for independence
Open interfaces, clear documentation, and reproducible methods let users take their work further without depending on a services team.
05 Founder-led by design
“The best analytical work does more than produce an answer. It helps people see a decision differently.”
Sam founded Orelian to bring together two ways of seeing. His background in social science and doctoral research in data science mean he can go deep into technically demanding work without losing sight of the systems, people and consequences behind it.
Orelian grew from a belief that consequential decisions deserve evidence equal to their complexity. Sam helps organisations turn ambitious questions into practical, trustworthy evidence systems without losing sight of the people and public purpose behind the data.
Orelian is founder-led. Sam remains involved from framing the question through to delivery, keeping responsibility for the thinking and the outcome in the same hands.
LiverpoolWorking across the UKRemote and on site
06 Start with the decision