About Arkmont
We both started our careers at Freshfields where we first worked together. Years later, both working as Fractional General Counsel to scaling businesses, we reconnected and found ourselves comparing notes on the same thing: the AI questions coming up in our client work were changing fast.
Businesses were asking whether they could use years of client data to build with AI; who owned work created with AI tools; how to respond to new AI restrictions appearing in customer contracts; and, increasingly, who in the business was actually using which tools. Many were facing these questions in RFPs. Boards were beginning to ask harder questions too.
Different businesses, different sectors, but the issue underneath was the same. This was no longer simply a question of “Is this allowed?” - it was about how businesses make good decisions around AI, who owns those decisions and what oversight is needed.
We wanted to know whether what we were seeing was broader than our own client work, so we spoke in confidence to founders, CEOs and senior leaders across 17 businesses. The pattern was remarkably consistent.
It became clear that treating AI governance as simply another legal or compliance exercise would miss the point. AI cuts across technology, data, contracts, people, commercial strategy and risk.
That ultimately led us to build Arkmont: working alongside leadership teams to bring legal, commercial and technical judgement together and put practical governance in place - not just another policy on the shelf.
The name reflects the role we want to play. AI is taking businesses into territory that is still being charted. Ark represents safe passage through fast-moving waters; Mont, the perspective to see further ahead. Together, they capture what Arkmont is there to provide: a steady hand at the helm helping businesses navigate what comes next, without losing momentum.
Arkmont exists to help businesses move forward with AI with greater clarity, confidence and control.
Alexis Goldfinch & Philip Dekker, Co-Founders of Arkmont