Jahan
Data, AI and research infrastructure · Health, research and government · Perth

Anyone can build now. Almost no one knows what to build.

That second part has been my job since 2000.

I've enrolled the patients, built the database, linked the data, run the platform and overseen the fund. Before that I built things on my own account: this company since 2000, a DVD-by-mail business, the world's first transportable water park. And for clients in games, music, festivals and retail. Now I help research institutes, government agencies and health services work out what they actually want. Then, with agents, I build it myself. No one in between.

Nasir David Jahan, Perth. Again from October 2026.

Who this is for

Research institutes, health services, government agencies, medical research and innovation offices, clinical trials networks and data linkage units. And anyone whose data is about to become the foundation for AI, whether they've noticed or not. Running a study? There's a page for you. In a WA agency with an AI brief? There's one for you too.

How I work

The brief is a symptom. That's fine. That's where we start.

I ask until the real problem shows up. Then I build the answer myself, with agents, with your team beside me. No product manager, no vendor, no three layers of handover between the idea and the keyboard. You get me. Not a team I manage, not a junior I bill through. It takes three things at once: understanding how the organisation actually works, the depth to build, and the judgement to know what's worth building. All three, in one person.

  1. UnderstandHow the organisation actually works, and whose permission it runs on. I know what gets rejected at the stewardship conversation before it's built, because for six years I sat on the approving side of it.
  2. DecideWhat's worth building, what isn't, and what first. Anyone can generate a roadmap. The job is knowing which line will still matter in eighteen months.
  3. BuildMyself, at the keyboard, with sovereign agents, inside your policy rather than around it. The idea goes straight to working software. When I leave, your team owns it. I've shipped products on my own money, so I know the difference between a demo and something that has to work on Monday.

One person means one conversation, one decision, and nothing lost between them. Fixed scope, agreed in writing. Built with your team beside me, documented, and theirs when I leave.

Brought in for one thing. Found the bigger picture. Built it.

Six of eleven, told the same four lines each time, in health and out of it. Open any of them, or read all eleven in full.

In health2019 to 2026

WA Data Linkage

2020–26 · WA Health

Australia's oldest linkage system, and a research community that needed it to move faster.

Brought in for
A directorate in the middle of a reform, rising demand for linked data, and a pandemic on the way.
Found
A world-pioneering system running on a monthly cycle, delivered by manual extract, and researchers waiting longer than anyone wanted.
Built
With the linkage team: two linkage strategies endorsed by the Minister, the system in the cloud, hourly linkage through COVID, and the distributed model behind PeopleWA.
Result
"Commending the Department is not something I'm known for in the linkage space. Certainly has been a turnaround." Prof David Preen, UWA.

The full story

REDCap, statewide

2019–26 · WA Health

Nobody asked for it. It was free, and already in the building.

Brought in for
There was no brief. Clinicians who needed to collect data safely, and a budget that would never stretch to them.
Found
A free, open-source platform built at Vanderbilt that could run inside the WA Health network. Nobody had treated it as infrastructure.
Built
The first instance fought in at Fiona Stanley as a research officer. Then, when the pandemic arrived, one statewide REDCap: hardened, governed, integrated.
Result
Telestroke, the Virtual ED, Virtual Immunology, the VAD Navigator Service, Cancer MDT. Hundreds more, built by clinicians, not bought from a vendor.

The full story

Platform governance

2024–25 · WA Health

The model was right. That turned out to be the easy part.

Brought in for
The governance model for a new enterprise health data platform.
Found
Everyone was treating it as a technology project. The real questions were who would own the decisions, who grants access and who says no, and nobody had asked them.
Built
An operating model built to liberate data, not ration it. A federated data council instead of a central gate. Small teams building governed data products together, in the open, with urgency, so trust in the product layer replaces the queue for raw extracts.
Result
Endorsed in principle. Not adopted in full: it was more change than the people who'd have to run it wanted. The lesson goes into every engagement since. A model is only as strong as the owner who wants it, so who owns it is now the first question I ask, not the last.

The full story

Outside healthClients and ventures of my own · 2000 to 2026 · Three of six. The rest are here

Big Day Out

2004 · Music festival

A ticketing company at war with its own customers.

Brought in for
A ticket website that kept crashing.
Found
A record-store ticket seller going online for the first time, and a scalping war with eBay it couldn't win by fighting.
Built
Online ticketing with tracked physical delivery. A face-value resale marketplace with verified tickets. A ballot that turned sold-out shows into second shows.
Result
Tickets that arrived. Scalpers with nothing to sell. Sold-out shows that became two.

The full story

Splash City

2015–17 · My own venture

A regulated operation that had to open anywhere, pass every inspection, then pack up and leave.

Brought in for
Nothing. My own money, and a bet that it could be done at all.
Found
Nobody had built a fully transportable water park. The problem was licensing, safety and logistics, not slides.
Built
The world's first, with the Guinness World Record tallest inflatable waterslide, and a consulting practice advising governments and operators on design and operations.
Result
It ran. It passed. Then it moved, and ran again.

The full story

ScriptTracker

2026 · My own build

The missing layer under the Australian eScript system: what a person actually has, and when it runs out.

Brought in for
Nothing. I wanted it to exist.
Found
People on five or more medicines run a small logistics operation every week. Every pharmacy app is built to sell a refill. None is built around that workflow.
Built
The patient's own record of what they have, what's owing and what to ask the GP for, plus the weekly box fill. Private by design.
Result
Shipped, and in use every week. Same method as the client work: watch the workflow before designing anything.

The full story

How I build now: ScriptTracker above and Talli, both built solo with agents in 2026. Same method as the client work.

How to start

Fixed scope, fixed fee, a clear end. Prices are indicative and firm up once I've seen the brief. I take one or two engagements at a time, so I'll tell you quickly whether it's one for me.

01

Second opinion

A roadmap, a business case, a vendor proposal, an AI strategy someone else wrote. I read it, and tell you what I see and what I'd do. In writing.

One day · $2,000 + GST 02

The real problem

Bring me the brief. I interview the people who actually do the work, and tell you what you're really solving. And whether AI has anything to do with it.

Two weeks · from $20,000 + GST 03

The data pathway

Getting research data out of a health system, and getting it approved the first time. I know what the approving side looks for.

Two weeks · from $20,000 + GST 04

The operating model

Who owns what, who grants access, what governed means in practice, and how the institutes keep their autonomy. I've written it at state scale.

Four weeks · from $45,000 + GST 05

Build it

When we know what to build, I build it, at the keyboard, with agents, with your team alongside. What the agents can see, where it sits and what never leaves your network is written down before I start, so your security people can check the answer rather than take my word for it.

Scoped per build

Finding the real problem since 2000.

Twenty-six years of it, in six industries. This is the short version. The whole story is here.

Nasir David

I came to health late and from the bottom: a volunteer at Fiona Stanley Hospital in 2018, enrolling patients in clinical studies to learn how research actually runs. That became a research officer role, then WA Health in 2019 to scope REDCap, then Director of Data and Information Systems from 2020. Linkage, analytics, engineering, governance, digital systems and sovereign AI. Ninety people by 2025.

In 2023 I was also Director of Medical Research and Innovation, overseeing the $250 million Future Health Research and Innovation Fund and promoting and facilitating the portfolio across the state. So I have sat on the funding side of the table as well as the data side. Since 2018 I have supported research from every side of it: the patient in front of you, the database, the linkage, the platform, the fund.

Before health: Jahan from 2000 to 2019, with Business Objects, Nortel Networks, Big Day Out and Shock Records among the clients. Splash City, the world's first fully transportable water park. Two years in the Kimberley on a plan to revive Stompem Ground, which changed how I approach anything that touches Aboriginal data.

In 2025 Corinium named me in its Global Top 100 Innovators in Data, Analytics and AI. In October 2026 I left government and relaunched Jahan full-time. The thread through all of it is the same: I start things. Businesses, platforms, a water park, a fund's portfolio, and two apps this year, Talli and ScriptTracker.

Perth, Western Australia · LinkedIn · The whole story

Same job, different rooms1996 to now
  1. 1996LucasArts, Sierra, Take2, games
  2. 1998Acclaim Entertainment, games
  3. 1999Psygnosis, marketing ANZ. Then Nortel
  4. 2000Jahan founded. Business Objects
  5. 2002DVD Direct - First DVD by Mail in WA
  6. 2004Big Day Out, Shock Records
  7. 2015Splash City
  8. 2018Fiona Stanley Hospital. Volunteer, then research officer
  9. 2019Jahan wound down. WA Health, to scope REDCap
  10. 2020Three roles at once, then Director, Data and Information Systems
  11. 2026Jahan relaunched, full-time. Talli, ScriptTracker. The whole story

Bring me the brief. We'll work out what it's really asking for.

nasir@jahan-interactive.com.au

Or message me on LinkedIn. Perth, Western Australia. Working with organisations across Australia. Reading: Insights.