BridewellCon 2025: Living the Values!

Last week, we held our third ever company conference – BridewellCon 2025!

Building upon our previous BridewellCons and reflecting the company’s growth over the last year, 2025 was our biggest yet. We had 300 people joining the two-day event from across the UK, France and US as we looked back on our achievements over the last year and ahead at the company’s future.

Bringing the Team Together

BridewellCon is our annual company conference where our employees from across the business come together to catch up, hear key updates, and talk about the next steps on Bridewell’s growth journey. As well as hearing from different areas within the business, we also invite industry leaders and experts to share their insights and experiences.

This year, we needed a bigger venue to host our expanded team and headed to The Celtic Manor Resort in Newport, South Wales.

Two Days of Going Above and Beyond

Welcoming a Range of Perspectives

After an introduction to the conference from our CEO, Anthony Young, our event hosts Hannah Rees, Head of Operations and Emran Ali, Associate Director took to the stage. We then kicked off the day with a panel discussion on cyber security in aviation.

The panel brought together Megan Poortman, Head of Cyber Security at Gatwick, and Matt Farmer, CISO at Heathrow. During the panel, they talked through the current threat landscape for the sector and how they’ve responded to recent high-profile attacks upon the retail sector, which has been a concern for them given their numerous partnerships with retailers within their airports. They also shared anecdotes from their time working with Bridewell and what cyber security challenges keep them up at night.

We then moved on to our next panel discussion – ‘One Team: Building Strong Client Partnerships’. Hosted by our Board Advisor, Ray Stanton, several of our clients joined the panel to share their views on what makes Bridewell unique as a cyber security partner. Panellist feedback ranged from appreciating our honesty, pragmatism and reactiveness to our willingness to challenge clients when we believe it will benefit their organisation.

Gavin Knapp, our Cyber Threat Intelligence Principal Lead, then took the stage for our first Capture the Flag of the conference. Giving us a glimpse into the world of cyber threat intelligence, Gavin tasked the room with researching publicly available information on threat actors, mimicking the OSINT work done by our CTI team.

'The Trailer Park Spy Ring: Inside a North Korean Espionage Campaign'

After lunch, we were joined by our first guest speaker: Geoff White. Bringing his experience as an author, speaker and investigative journalist to bear, Geoff discussed North Korea’s increasing involvement in the world of cyber crime. In his talk, he looked at how their tactics had changed over the years leading to a large-scale spy ring being run from an unassuming trailer park in Minnesota.

Our various Bridewell Networks were next up, sharing updates on the great work they’ve been doing over the last year.We heard from the Defence and Emergency Services Network, the Neurodiversity Network, Pridewell, and the Bridewell Women’s Network, who have all been hard at work over the last 12 months to promote an inclusive workplace where everyone can thrive.Felipe Varela, Senior Lead Security Consultant, and Dan Saunders, Senior Lead Consultant, also shared some personal insight into the support Bridewell has been providing to their chosen charities this year. With 10 charities put forward from across the business this year, Bridewell took the step to support all of them. Felipe and Dan spoke about their respective, nominated charities: Down Syndrome Cheshire and No Name Theatre Group.

Looking Ahead and Welcoming I-TRACING

Closing out day one, we had an update from our CEO, Anthony Young. His talk highlighted how the CNI cyber security market is changing and creating new opportunities, as well as looking at the business’ growth in the last 12 months. Anthony also spoke to some exciting future developments in the business (more to come later!).

For the first time, we were also joined at Bridewell Con by our sister company, I-TRACING. Having entered a strategic partnership with them earlier this year, it was a great opportunity for the entire Bridewell team to hear firsthand from I-TRACING’s CEO, Théodore-Michel Vrangos, and Laurent Besset, Cyberdefense Director. In their talk we heard about why they chose to partner with us, touching on our shared values and human-centric approach, as well as diving into the details of their MDR service.

Dinner, Awards, and Questionable Moves on the Dancefloor

With the day’s presentations complete, the Bridewell team braved the weather and spread out across Celtic Manor to take part in their chosen activities. This was shortly followed by dinner and the Bridewell Awards, presented by Jasper Marlow, Director of Strategic Accounts and Partnerships, and Tori Stone, Head of Bids. Many congratulations to our various award winners for living the Bridewell values.

A picture says a thousand words and some of the moves witnessed on the dance floor deserve no shorter a description. At the end of the night, we all headed down to the Bridewell Underground for the after-party, hosted by Gavin Stubbs, Principal Consultant.

The Pub Quiz and Future of Cyber

Moving onto day two, and we started the morning with Ben Vaughan, Chief Commercial Officer, and Ruth Billen, Chief Financial Officer, hosting the Bridewell pub quiz. With every round focusing on a different Bridewell team, there was little evidence of a siloed business here as participants correctly identified who in the People team had a pet sheep and who in Sales closed the most deals.

This was followed by Martin Riley, Chief Technology Officer, and Sam Thorton, Chief Operating Officer, discussing the future of cyber. Looking at the current geopolitical landscape and usage of AI, Martin shared his insights into where the biggest cyber threats truly lie. Sam built on this with a view to where Bridewell’s service lines will develop in the future to reflect these trends.

Back by popular demand, Luiz Simpson, Head of Red Team, brought us another penetration testing-inspired Capture the Flag. In just an hour, Luiz stumped us all with dozens of questions ranging from the passenger legroom in a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, identifying the location of an unsecured security camera, to discovering hidden parcels around the room.

Championing Neurodiversity

Next, we heard from our final guest speakers: Holly Foxcroft, an international speaker for neurodiversity, and Mandy Hickson, former RAF Fast-jet Pilot. Holly’s talk touched on the importance of creating an inclusive environment for neurodivergent individuals, as well as highlighting their capabilities in the cyber security space, while Mandy shared her experience as one of the RAF’s first female tornado pilots.

Bringing day two of the conference to a close, Torben Rees, Senior Lead Developer, and Alan Crouch, Principal Consultant, delivered part two of our charity spotlight as their chosen charities: Blue Light Symphony Orchestra and Kith & Kids.

A massive thank you to all our attendees and speakers this year. A special thanks to our People and Marketing teams for their hard work in organising another brilliant BridewellCon. Here’s to next year!