Directors' Profiles

Ian Painter, Managing Director

Co-founder of Snowflake, Ian has a passion for both business and technology and can still 'cut code' with the best of our developers (if only they'd let him - and he had the time). Ian sets the strategic direction for the company and runs the commercial team to make this a reality. Ian lives and breaths everything Snowflake and spends his lunchtimes annoying his good friend Eddie (our CTO) with his 'ideas for the future'. Passionate about the company he helped build, Ian constantly strives to continue Snowflake's growth, whilst at the same time keeping that 'old school' feel of three men and some code!

Prior to Snowflake, Ian was Senior Technical Consultant at Ordnance Survey, where he lead the technical team responsible for the creation of OS MasterMap - all 500 millions features of it!

Eddie Curtis, Chief Technology Officer and co-founder

Back in 2001 (after few beers) Eddie decided to go into business with Ian and set up Snowflake. Today, Eddie is our CTO, responsible for the Technical Team and Product Management of the business. Respected in the industry for his technical know how and domain expertise, Eddie spends his days talking to our customers and getting their wish lists designed and built in our products.

Working across the room from Ian, Eddie worked at Ordnance Survey where he led the development of its core product delivery database used for generation of OS MasterMap - again all 500 millions features of it!

Simon Perry, Director

Six months after starting Snowflake, Ian and Eddie persuaded Simon to give up his lucrative IT contractor job and start work at Snowflake for next to nothing! In the early years Simon made our first product (GO Loader) a reality, cramming in plenty of last minute functionality to make Snowflake stand out from the crowd. Today Simon is our Finance Director but when he's not keeping the finances in order he still contributes code to our core products.

Before joining Snowflake, Simon was an independent IT contractor working for companies including IBM and Legal & General. Prior to contracting, Simon worked in Latvia as the International Consultant for Ordnance Survey.

Peter Woodsford MBE, Chairman

Peter was appointed a non-executive director of Snowflake Software Ltd in 2002 and is currently our Chairman and chief sounding board.

Highly regarded within the GIS industry, Peter is the author of over thirty publications on Geographic Information as well as being a visiting Professor at University College London and a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors. In 1990 Peter was Chairman of the Association for Geographic Information (AGI) and more recently, President of EuroSDR Commission 5. Peter was awarded an MBE for services to the geographic information industry in the Queen's Birthday Honours List, June 2010.

Peter is one of the most respected figures of the GIS industry and we're very honored to have him as our Chairman.