Ian Stevenson
I specialise in supporting early stage technology companies on the journey from
idea to customer.
I help to shape the product and offering, gain market knowledge and feedback,
and make contact with (and sales to) early adopters. Very often this activity needs
to be funded, and I have experience of preparing business plans and pitches for
investors. I can also assist with everything from building the team and board to
producing marketing materials and attending trade shows.
I have over 15 years experience in commercialising technology as an engineer, consultant,
executive, founder, and working on behalf of investors. This ideally places me to
contribute to all aspects of building and growing young companies, and especially
to help bridge the gap that often exists between a core technology and market needs.
Since completing the Saltire Fellowship in 2009 I have been working through Salient Point
with a variety of startup companies to help them get new technology to market - there are some details
on the clients page.
|
Resources
|
Career History
Saltire Fellowship 2009
During 2009 I participated in the inagural Saltire Foundation Fellowship programme, designed to educate
the next generation of entrepreneurial business leaders for Scotland. This took
me to Babson College near Boston
for the first four months, followed by 3 months doing an Executive Internship with
Sun Microsystems at the heart of
Silicon Valley. My second placement was 3 months working in a marketing role with
Scottish company ATEEDA, building
a market report, identifying strategic approaches to the market and supporting sales
activity.
Employment History
Prior to joining the Saltire Fellowship programme in January 2009 I worked in the
high tech industry for over 10 years. I started out working full time at Edinburgh
University spin-out VLSI Vision (camera microchips), which went through IPO and
ultimately acquisition by STMicroelectronics during my 4 years there. I started
out writing highly technical software, and ended up running a key part of the software
group and co-ordinating activity between the software and hardware (ASIC) groups.
My first career move was to Cambridge consultancy Scientific Generics (now rebranded
as Sagentia) where I spent a further 4 years
working on a huge range of projects, from innovative technology development and
prototyping through to technology strategy and due diligence. My time at Scientific
Generics expanded my experience into the business domain and international markets,
in industries from telecommunications to medical devices and FMCG. It also
helped me to develop a strong interest in helping small companies to bring new technology
to market.
My most recent post was as Chief Technology Officer at CHIL, a software start-up based in Dunfermline. At
CHIL I lead the transformation of the core technology from prototype to commercial
implementations, and managed early customer engagements which ultimately resulted
in follow-on projects. Being in a small company environment I also had the
opportunity to learn a lot about the challenges faced by an organically growing
business without external capital.
In addition, I worked in the marine industry running sonar and navigation systems
for pipeline survey during my time at university. This alongside my interest
in running sound and lighting systems for large scale live events gave me early
practical experience as a consumer of sophisticated technology in harsh environments
- crucial to understanding the difference between a technology and a product.
I was also a founding director of DeliveredSafe Ltd, a startup in the delivery logistics
market, for which seed funding fell through when the markets crashed in 2008.
Ian Stevenson's Technical Publications
- Scientific Generics White Papers (now
Sagentia)
- The Electronic Imaging Explosion (2001)
- The Future of PC Connectivity (2002)
- But We Don't Do Web Services (2003)
- The IET (formerly IEE) publication
"Computing and Control Engineering"
- .NET Core Architecture (October 2003)
- .NET Platform Technology (October 2003)
- Data on Data (June / July 2004)
- Elektron, the publication of the
South African Institute of Electrical Engineers
- .NET Core Architecture (May 2004)
- The The Visual Systems Journal (VSJ)