Biography
Trained as an economist, I spent the first 20 years of my working life in building materials before stumbling upon GIS. A chance conversation led to me becoming General Manager of GDC and Head of Professional Services at whereonearth.com during the wackiest part of the dot com boom and bust.
In 2002 some colleagues and I bought out GDC with investment support from nearly all of the employees. MapInfo bought the business in 2007. After working for MapInfo for 18 months as UK MD and Director of Product and Industry Strategy, EMEA I branched out to look for the next big thing.
Through my consultancy KnowWhere, I work as a non-executive director, a strategic consultant and an investor, advisor and mentor to technology startups. I am currently chairman of geo.me, a Google Maps Partner and a strategic advisor to the board of Astun Technology, the UK's leading Open Source geobusiness and a member of the Advisory Board of OpenCage Data.
I was chairman of Exprodat Consulting which provides geo-services to the oil and gas industry until Jun 2016 when they were acquired by Getech plc. I was a Special Lecturer at the School of Geography at the University of Nottingham until the end of 2014, where I helped to start the OSM-GB project.
I am a Charter Member of the OSGeo Foundation and treasurer of the UK chapter. I was chair of the LOC for FOSS4G 2013 in Nottingham in September 2013 and deputy chair of FOSS4GUK in 2016.
When not working, I blog, twitter, talk about geography, technology, things open and politics and follow the Arsenal.
