Richard Garforth — CTO
I’m a technology and infrastructure leader with deep experience running large-scale, business-critical platforms in complex, regulated environments. I stay technically credible and close to the detail, working directly with engineering teams while helping senior leaders make clear, informed decisions about risk, cost, and delivery. I’m currently Head of Infrastructure at Evoke, supporting global brands including William Hill, 888, and Mr Green. I lead distributed engineering teams across the UK, Europe, and Israel, accountable for platforms that operate under constant commercial, regulatory, and availability pressure. A core focus of my role is improving the economics and resilience of infrastructure at scale. This includes modernising legacy estates, shaping private and hybrid cloud strategy, and simplifying operating models to reduce waste, remove unnecessary complexity, and ensure technology investment delivers real business value. Automation is a core lever in how I run infrastructure. I focus on reducing manual intervention, improving consistency, and making systems easier to operate and reason about at scale. This includes treating infrastructure as code, enabling self-service where it makes sense, and using automation to remove failure modes rather than simply responding to them. I see AI as an accelerant rather than a shortcut. Used well, it can improve observability, incident response, and decision support for engineers and leaders. Used badly, it adds noise and false confidence on top of fragile systems. I’m particularly interested in how AI can augment operational judgement, surface weak signals earlier, and shift teams from reactive firefighting towards preventative work. I work where strategy becomes execution. I partner closely with senior stakeholders and boards to turn technical complexity into clear options and trade-offs, while supporting teams in strengthening reliability and day-to-day operational discipline. Developing people is central to how I lead. I take a servant-leadership approach, coaching senior engineers and leaders, setting clear expectations, and creating environments where good engineering judgement is trusted and accountability is explicit. Always open to connecting with people who care about sustainable platforms, strong teams, and technology that earns its keep.
Stackforce AI infers this person is a technology leader in the gaming industry, specializing in infrastructure management and operational excellence.
Location: Barnsley, England, United Kingdom
Experience: 38 yrs 9 mos
Skills
- Infrastructure Management
- It Operations Management
- Cost Management
- Leadership
- People Management
- Team Leadership
- Automation
- Configuration Management
- Devops
- Production Support
- Data Warehousing
- Windows Server
Career Highlights
- Delivered over £2.4m in cost savings through negotiation.
- Transformed teams to Agile methodologies, improving efficiency.
- Led infrastructure for major gaming brands under pressure.
Work Experience
evoke
Head of Infrastructure (2 yrs 3 mos)
William Hill
Infrastructure Engineering Manager (1 yr 11 mos)
Infrastructure Engineering Team Leader (3 yrs)
Senior Lead Infrastructure Engineer (2 yrs 8 mos)
Infrastructure Engineer (4 mos)
HSBC
HSBC (combined senior entry) (9 yrs 11 mos)
HSBC (early career, compressed) (7 yrs 8 mos)
Leeds Beckett University
Senior Systems programmer/ Principle Lecturer (8 yrs)
Open Solutions Ltd/ Perrin Systems Ltd
Programmer & UNIX Support Engineer (3 yrs)
