Dr. James Crawford
After leading software research and development for over two decades, Jimi is the founder & CTO of Orbital Insight. Orbital Insight helps business and policy decision-makers understand economic and societal trends through geospatial analytics. His corporate focus is to develop artificial intelligence, machine learning, and computer vision, creating a new source of market data for diverse industries.
Before a successful $1B Monsanto acquisition, Jimi was the SVP of Science and Engineering at the Climate Corporation. Prior to that, he was CTO and Software Architect at Moon Express whose goal was putting the first commercial robot on the moon. As the Engineering Director for Google Book Search, he was in charge of
Googleâs project to scan, index, and make searchable all the worldâs books. As EVP of Engineering at Composite Software, he led product development around data visualization. At Nasa Ames Research Center, Jimi led Autonomy and Robotics projects and authored over 15 peer-reviewed publications, resulting in five patents. Jimi earned his Ph.D. and Masterâs degrees in Computer Science from the University of Texas at Austin, and BA in Math and Computer Science from Rice University.
He has a long-term interest in photography which led him, most recently, to eastern Idaho to photograph the August total eclipse.
Luciano Giesso
Luciano Giesso serves as International Sales Director at Satellogic. He is a multinational executive with more than 20 yearsâ experience in technology & services. Heâs Argentinian and has lived in the United States at different times during his career.
Mr. Giesso has led multi-country teams of 100+ employees in many countries occupying several management and sales positions in technology companies, including a 14-year tenure in IBM.
Fluent in English, Spanish, French, Portuguese and German, Mr. Giesso holds an Engineerâs Degree from UCA and an MBA from San AndreĚs University, both in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He has also completed executive programs in Harvard Business School and MIT Sloan School of Management.
Dr. Shay Har-Noy
Dr. Shay Har-Noy (Shy) is Spireâs General Manager of Aviation, responsible for leading the business that is making air travel and shipments safer, more cost effective, and more efficient. Shay most recently served as a leader on the Uber Maps product team and as Uber Boulder site lead. Previously, he was VP and GM of Maxar/DigitalGlobe’s Platform business — their high growth effort to get DigitalGlobeâs 15 year digital library in the cloud and available for processing.
Prior to joining DigitalGlobe, Shay was founder and CEO of Tomnod combining crowdsourcing and machine learning to create new applications for satellite imagery. Tomnod was acquired by DigitalGlobe in early 2013.  Shay started his career at ViaSat where he worked on the deployment and market positioning of satellite communication systems around the globe for government, commercial aviation, and maritime customers. Dr. Har-Noy graduated summa cum laude from Rice University and received a Ph.D in Electrical Engineering with research in image processing from UC-San Diego.
Scott Herman
Scott Herman is the CEO of Cognitive Space â a startup focusing on AI-driven satellite operations and mission planning. Scott is a passionate New Space, Small Satellite, Remote Sensing, ML/AI/CV Analytics, Agile Development, Lean Startup, and Cloud Computing evangelist. Scott is deeply involved in strategic planning, business development, product management, and software development. But at any given moment Scott is also supporting program management, production operations, concept incubation, community outreach & evangelism, industry mentorship, customer service, and investment activities. What a cool job! Scott works at Cognitive Space in Chantilly, VA
Scott has spent most of his career developing and deploying Remote Sensing, Imagery Analysis, Sensor Fusion, Knowledge Management, and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for the National Security community. Before becoming the CEO of Cognitive Space, Scott was the CTO at BlackSky, a satellite analytics company that recently IPOâd as the latest âNew Space unicornâ. Before BlackSky, Scott ran Products and Platform at Maxar. Scott is also an advisor/mentor with the Techstars âNew Spaceâ investment portfolios â a venture capital accelerator for startups.
Nina Soleng
Nina has more than 10 years of experience in the satellite industry, having held various positions while at KSAT. With a background from publishing and content marketing, she is currently responsible for the company´s communication across the business units.
Representing KSAT, Nina travels to countries around the world speaking on panels and seminars, engaging government and commercial stakeholders.
In her previous role as International Sales Manager, Ninaâs main focus was Maritime Monitoring services based on SAR data (Synthetic Aperture Radar). KSAT provides oil spill monitoring and vessel detection services globally and has pioneered the industry with pushing the timelines for Near-Real-Time (NRT) delivery of actionable information- leveraging the global ground network, especially the unique Svalbard station.
Nina has had the opportunity to work with several of the most significant international oil companies (IOC´s), government authorities, coastguards and other stakeholders with key focus areas in Latin America, South America, and the Middle East.
Her portfolio also included the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA), an Agency providing technical assistance and support to the European Commission and Member States on maritime safety, pollution by ships, and maritime security.
Nina is former Chairman of the Norwegian Oil Spill Control Association, (NOSCA), a non- profit association dedicated to promoting products and services within global oil spill preparedness and response, representing more than 30 Norwegian companies.
She lives in the Arctic Capital of Tromsø in Norway- an ideal place for Polar Ground Stations and cross-country skiing.
Dr. John Springmann
Dr. John Springmann is VP of Space at Tomorrow.io, where he is responsible for the development of its space program and radar products. He completed his Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan and has played key roles in the development of space weather CubeSats, commercial remote sensing constellations, and general-purpose spacecraft. Previously, he was Chief Engineer at BlackSky Global (2014-2018), where he was responsible for the spacecraft development, operations, and overall constellation architecture. As an independent consultant, he was instrumental in the development of the Photon satellite at Rocket Lab (2018-2020). His expertise is in space mission design, spacecraft systems engineering, and technical program execution.