One outlook structure runs against any driver the business names, so every driver gets the same analysis rather than only the ones someone had time for.
Back to all proofs
From one quarterly market report to intelligence that arrives every week
Client
Date
$75B+ European energy utility, one national business
09/2026
The challenge
Inside a $75B+ European energy utility, one national business ran its market intelligence on a single quarterly report – quarterly only because of the effort it took, while the market moved faster than that. The national studies it had to weigh ran to 400 pages, almost all in the local language.
The solution
FifthRow deployed a market intelligence and strategic foresight layer that the client's own analysts operate. A demand driver, a company or a policy area goes in; a structured, source-traced study comes out, saved as a reusable template in the team's own catalogue and put on a schedule when the question recurs.
212,817
analyst-hours equivalent, 410 FTEs27,922
research questions answered from sourcesForward market outlooks22 completed in one working day
Standing intelligence5 systems on a fixed schedule
Deepest single study25 checked steps in about two hours
Evidence base166,778 sources analysed
Analyst-hours equivalent212,817 hours saved; equivalent to 410 FTEs
The business needed a forward view on every driver that moves its market, not only the two or three someone had time to study. One system produces the same structured outlook for any driver it is pointed at.
Core Activities
- Reproduced the team's own outlook structure so it runs once per driver, rather than one scan stretched across all of them
- Took a whole driver set to finished outlooks in a single working day
- Scanned each driver through political, economic, social, technological and environmental lenses, plus the legal lens the team's own framework adds
- Kept national signals separate from macro-regional and global ones, so a local read is never inferred from a global one
- Carried uncertainties through to scenarios and a short foresight memo instead of stopping at signals
The Results
A forward, source-traced outlook on every driver the business had named, produced to the same structure each time, so drivers can be compared against each other rather than read one at a time.
22 outlooks
completed in one working dayMarket news arrives as one undifferentiated stream and most of it is irrelevant. A tracker built with the team sorts the market into peer groups by the role each player takes, and returns a graded shortlist for each.
Core Activities
- Watched each peer group through its own lens, because a contractor and a competitor are not read the same way
- Ran one research pass per company rather than one pass across a list, so nobody drops off the end of it
- Graded every item low, medium or high for relevance before it reaches a shortlist
- Returned a top five per group with a short statement of why it matters, sized for a leadership read
- Held the recurring topic set inside the system, with a free field for whatever mattered that week
The Results
A standing read on what every tracked group of players has announced, priced and launched, graded for relevance and short enough to put in front of a management team without editing.
~22,000
analyst-hours equivalent, market trackingSubscribed newsletters produced several opinions a day and rarely made clear when something had actually been decided. Five systems now run on a fixed schedule and report only what changed.
Core Activities
- Put market and policy coverage on weekly and fortnightly schedules, delivered to inbox without anyone starting a run
- Reported the period against the one before it, so what lands is what moved
- Ran both a backward look at what was decided and a forward look at what is coming
- Traced each item through to the parts of the business it touches
- Directed the scans at local-language sources, not only at English-language coverage of the market
The Results
A period-by-period picture of the market and its regulation that arrives on a fixed day, separates decisions from commentary, and names the business line each item affects.
38
update runs delivered without anyone requesting themThe deepest system on the account takes an area of interest and returns a full opportunity study: market structure, technology landscape, white space, and a first pass at what to do about it.
Core Activities
- Ran a 25-step study end to end in about two hours, from a single line of input
- Split discovery from ideation once the team wanted them separately, then ran each on demand
- Screened emerging technologies and scouted the companies working on them
- Assessed maturity before ideas were framed, so a concept carries a readiness view from the start
- Added market sizing and value-pool quantification where the number decided the answer
The Results
A repeatable route from an area of interest to a structured opportunity study with white space, candidate ideas and a maturity view, produced inside a working morning rather than as a project.
~47,000
analyst-hours equivalent, opportunity discoveryAlongside the standing systems, the platform absorbed the one-off company questions that used to be answered by hand, late, or not at all.
Core Activities
- Profiled peers, operators in other national markets, and the companies selling into the sector
- Applied one structure to every profile: strategy, products, pricing, partnerships, leadership and risk
- Tracked what a single company had done inside a defined period, rather than restating what it is
- Compared competing technology providers like for like on a live buying question
- Kept every profile in the team's own catalogue, so the next question starts from a baseline
The Results
A same-standard profile on any company the business needs a view on, produced in-house inside a day and reusable as context for the next question.
32
company studies run in-house, none commissionedWhat it proved
Seven people across three teams ran 1,688 research studies against 166,778 sources in three months, answering 27,922 research questions from those sources. On one working day they produced 22 forward outlooks, one per driver, alongside a refresh of every tracked peer group. Five standing systems delivered 38 scheduled updates in that time, with nobody starting them.
A function that published one market report a quarter now holds a weekly read on the market and its regulation, a same-structure forward outlook on any driver it names, and a company profile available the same day. Sixty-eight of the research templates in its catalogue were built by its own analysts and rerun 412 times, so a repeat question starts from a working method rather than a blank brief. This is a regulated business, where better research returns efficiency rather than new revenue, and across those 1,688 runs the platform records 212,817 analyst-hours saved, the equivalent of 410 full-time analysts. That total includes the testing and iteration behind systems the team went on to reuse as templates.
Results
| Metric | Benchmark | Result | Improvement |
|---|---|---|---|
| Market intelligence cadence | One report a quarter, quarterly because of the effort it took | Standing systems delivering weekly and fortnightly | 13× more often |
| Forward outlooks per driver | Whichever few drivers the team had time to study | A full driver set completed in one working day | 22 outlooks, same structure each |
| Regulatory reading | Several subscribed opinion updates a day, decisions hard to find | Scheduled watch reporting only what changed | A day's reading replaced by the decisions in it |
| Company research | Assembled by hand, when someone had time | 32 same-standard studies run in-house | No study commissioned for any of them |
| Depth per study | One analyst reading one source at a time | 25 checked steps in about two hours | A full opportunity study in a working morning |
| Analyst-hours saved | Manual desk research across two teams | 212,817 hours across 1,688 runs | Equivalent of adding 410 full-time analysts |
Every tracked item carries a relevance grade before it reaches a shortlist, so a management read starts from what matters instead of from everything found.
Research is directed at sources in the market's own language, so national evidence is read directly rather than inferred from English-language coverage.
Each company on a watchlist gets its own research pass, so a long list never quietly loses the companies at the end of it.
Scheduled systems report what moved in the period rather than what exists, so a standing brief stays short enough to be read.
The team's own analysts save and rerun the systems they build, so new coverage never waits on outside build effort.
Cutting a four-month research cycle to six weeks across five validation workstreams
Client
$25B+ US energy & home-services company
Date
08/2026
6 days
intake brief to ranked reportFrom a weekly newsletter to a self-running innovation radar
Client
$70B+ global energy utility
Date
08/2026
284,680
analyst-hours equivalent, 71 FTEsFor Enterprises
ProofSee all
From a standing start to an AI venture serving small businesses
From 72 patents to 4 commercialisation-ready technologies
Cutting a four-month research cycle to six weeks across five validation workstreams
From a weekly newsletter to a self-running innovation radar
A full year's validated-concept target, met in the first quarter
A utility innovation lab that answers its own questions in a day
Finding the next high-growth US metro in five days
FifthRow – The Agentic Consultancy
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