Josh Valman

Press Pack

Professional Keynote Speaker

Background and Bio

In 2023, after 12 years as an independant company, the operation was acquired to become RPDK, a part of the Kinara International manufacturing group.

Throughout this time, Josh has worked with some of the largest businesses ( including Carlsberg, Unilever and GSK) and some of the smallest startups launching global products from a bedroom with the help of his business. The challenges in these businesses have often been seen as engineering problems - however more often than not it is the people and the organisation change that Josh and his team delivered that made the difference.

Josh is also a frequent investor in engineering businesses, sitting on the boards of several UK companies as well as in advisory and grant board positions at the Royal Academy of Engineering and several investment firms - bringing specific engineering knowledge to the table.

Josh started his engineering career age 10 years old, when the BBC TV Show Robot Wars first started airing. He joined what was revealed to be a global force of engineering competitions, initially working with Lego and household tools, learning to use design software and the maths behind what makes things work.

As the designs became more complex, Josh began working with factories in the UK to machine parts from his drawings, until ending up working with factories in China aged 13, to produce more complex ideas. By 15 he was working with global businesses on their manufacturing strategies and engineering designs.

At 17 Josh was fired. Nobody had ever asked how old their supply chain consultant was. Whilst running multi-million dollar production strategies for public companies, he was also still sitting high school exams.

Josh went on to found RPD International. A business joining the dots between ideas and mass production. RPD helped businesses take concepts and prototypes, create commercial engineering designs and set up supply chains to launch and scale new products. The work was broad, from complex medical devices and surgical devices, to consumer electronics and even sex toys.