About Us

A dedicated and experienced team of InSAR specialists

 

 

 

About Us

 

Making InSAR Accessible

With over 80 years of experience we’re changing how you access and interpret satellite ground movement data. Our mission is to make this once expensive dataset affordable, accessible and easy to interpret. From our up-to-date user friendly SatShop portal to our bespoke machine learning models - we’re here to help you to get the best risk management and business decisions from InSAR.

Meet the Team

Professor Tim Wright

Co-Founder & Director
Tim Wright is Professor of Satellite Geodesy at the University of Leeds and director of COMET, the UK Natural Environment Research Council's Centre for the Observation and Modelling of Earthquakes, Volcanoes and Tectonics. He has pioneered the development of InSAR for the measurement of tectonic deformation due to continental collision and magmatic rifting. He jointly leads a major academic project that is using Sentinel-1 InSAR to map tectonic strain globally. He has received numerous awards for his academic work including the American Geophysical Union's Geodesy Section Award (2014) and the Royal Astronomical Society's Harold Jeffreys Lectureship (2017). He co-founded SatSense in 2018 and is a company director.

Professor Andy Hooper

Co-Founder & Director
Andy Hooper is Professor of Geodesy and Geophysics at the University of Leeds. He has pioneered the development of new algorithms to accurately extract deformation of the ground from time series of satellite radar images, which are now widely used in the community (StaMPS). He led the long-term deformation effort in a major European project, FUTUREVOLC, which established an integrated volcanological monitoring procedure in Iceland, and is now leading the work to integrate and model geophysical, geochemical, and petrological monitoring data in the EUROVOLC project. In 2016 he was awarded the James B. Macelwane medal by the American Geophysical Union. He co-founded SatSense in 2018 and is a company director.

Matthew Bray

CEO
Matthew is excited by dynamic businesses making their mark on the industry and joined the SatSense team after being blown away by the potential of the technology and the strength of the technical team. He's held Technical, Sales, Commercial and General Management roles. In joining SatSense, Matthew returns to the North after a spell down south for study and work, latterly spending 10 years helping grow a VC-backed Cambridge technology spin- out to market leader, and ultimately acquisition by Volution Group plc. He holds a degree in mechanical engineering, a masters in engineering management and a PhD in engineering from Cambridge, and believes that with clear direction and hard work, you will be amazed with what you can achieve. He is happily married with two children, two dogs, two Land Rovers, two motorbikes and one wife.

Karsten Spaans

Lead Engineer
Karsten is a remote sensing specialist with over 10 years of experience in INSAR processing on large scales in academic and commercial settings. He currently heads up the technical team at SatSense. Before that, Karsten did a Masters degree in Aerospace Engineering, specialising in Earth and Planetary Observation, from Delft University of Technology, as well as a PhD degree from the University of Leeds, in Geodesy and Geophysics.

Yusuf Ibrahim-Zai

Head of Sales
Yusuf Ibrahim-Zai is the Head of Sales at SatSense. He has over a decade of experience in sales and operations management and throughout his career, Yusuf has been passionate about working with companies that use science and technology to improve the world around us. He has held leadership roles at both start-up and blue-chip companies such as Apple and Tesla and has a track record of success in driving revenue and building highly motivated teams. Coupled with a BA in Geography from the University of Cambridge, Yusuf is well-equipped to navigate the complex world of engineering and satellite data analysis. Outside of work, Yusuf enjoys competing in cycling and triathlon events across the world, having represented Team GB for Age Group triathlon.

Contact us today to learn how SatSense can help you get the most from satellite derived ground movement data

 

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