SK Siddharth Karandikar
Brief

The technical edge

I can tell which parts of a pitch are physics.

More of the problems strategy teams are hired for have technology inside them. These are the systems I have built in, and the client question each one helps answer.

  1. 01

    Telecom operators · Network equipment vendors

    The question is not whether a model predicts congestion in simulation. It is whether that model survives contact with real network data.

    Congestion prediction in the 5G radio network · 2026 – ongoing · in progress

    Why a client would care

    Operators are being sold AI that was trained in simulators. This project measures exactly how much of that performance survives real telemetry, which is the question a buyer should ask before signing.

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  2. 02

    Telecom · Automotive · Defence and drones

    A framework nobody could reproduce now runs 64 times cheaper, with three errors in the original corrected.

    OTFS-ISAC reproduction study · 2026

    Why a client would care

    This is technical due diligence. A published result that no one outside the authors can run is a claim, not a fact, and three of these results did not survive being checked. The same discipline applies to any vendor's technical pitch.

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  3. 03

    Why a client would care

    Much of the cost of a medical device sits in specialised hardware. Showing that a commodity chip can hold clinical timing is the kind of finding that changes a device's bill of materials and its price point.

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  4. 04

    Automotive · EV and component suppliers

    You can validate an engine control unit without owning an engine.

    Speed control in an automotive ECU · Feb – May 2025

    Why a client would care

    Modern cars carry dozens of control units, and testing them on vehicles is slow and expensive. Bench validation is where much of an automotive supplier's engineering cost and time-to-market is decided.

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  5. 05

    Banking and payments · Telecom operators

    Payments survive peak load only if the network slice is reallocated while the surge is happening.

    Banking transactions over 5G network slices · Jan – May 2025

    Why a client would care

    Banks and operators are now negotiating who pays for guaranteed latency on payment traffic. Knowing where static allocation fails, and what dynamic allocation costs, is the technical half of that commercial conversation.

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