Safer. Stronger.
More secure

Our History

At Digital Barriers, we are dedicated to creating a stronger, safer, more secure world through innovative solutions that create richer digital experiences. Our Edge-AI and IOT surveillance solutions have led the way for defence, security and counter-terrorism organisations across the world and have become integral to the effectiveness of operations, providing vital insight that puts decision-makers in control.

In an increasingly connected world, our goal is to empower organisations, when they need it most and in the most challenging operational environments. With a philosophy built on delivering world-class solutions through better technology and a shared commitment to producing cutting-edge solutions, we continue to redefine the art of edge intelligence.

Established in 2009 through an IPO on the UK Alternative Investment Market (AIM), Digital Barriers secured an MBO of the business with backing from Volpi Capital, a UK private equity investor, in 2017.

Headquartered in the UK with regional offices in the US, Europe and Asia-Pacific the business has developed a trusted global customer-base spanning industries such as defence and national security, law enforcement, border security, first responders, critical national infrastructure, transportation agencies, automotive and mobility and private security in over 60 over countries.

INNOVATION

20 years of
technology

Dynamic, bold and pioneering, we are exceptionally proud of our technology and its makers who are still with the business today. With over 20 years of innovation, the commitment of our people to their work means we are always pushing the boundaries of what is possible, challenging the world and questioning the status quo to deliver unrivalled capability.

20

our people the board

Zak Doffman

Founder & CEO
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Zak Doffman

Zak Doffman is the Founder and CEO of Digital Barriers, responsible for the overall management and operations of the company. Zak founded the business in 2009 to capitalise on commercial opportunities within the security, defence and law enforcement markets. Zak began his career with Andersen Consulting (now Accenture), before becoming Group Strategy and Development Director at Detica (now part of BAE Systems).

Since forming Digital Barriers, Zak has led a redefinition of the market for real-time surveillance utilising IoT connectivity and Edge-AI technologies, delivering game-changing disruptive technology, driving the business from strength to strength whilst solidifying its leading position in the marketplace.

Zak is a key influencer in the emergence of edge-intelligence, AI surveillance and the public safety vs privacy debate - championing the appropriate and proportionate use of advanced security technologies in the real world. He is the primary spokesperson for the business and is regularly featured on global news and media outlets, including BBC News, Sky News, NPR, NBC News and Channel 4 News. Zak also covers security and surveillance for Forbes.

Neville Davis

Non-Executive Chairman
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Neville Davis

Neville Davis is an experienced Chairman and Non-Executive Director, having chaired 13 companies over the last decade, with a particular focus on PE backed technology businesses.

Previously an entrepreneurial leader in the IT sector, with 24 years as a Chief Executive (including 12 years when the company was quoted) driving the growth of the business from revenue of £5m to £300m. Professional background as a Chartered Accountant.


Stuart Purves

Chief Financial Officer
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Stuart Purves

Stuart Purves is the Chief Financial Officer at Digital Barriers and brings invaluable leadership and operational experience in addition to the management of finance and accounting. Having previously worked as the Corporate Development Manager at the company in 2011, Stuart re-joined Digital Barriers in 2017 following the MBO to help drive the long-term business objectives and financial planning. With over 16 years in the finance industry, Stuart’s previous roles include Finance Director for Barratt London Aldgate, European Finance Director for Laing O’Rourke and Assistant Director in EY’s Private Equity Transaction Services team in London. Stuart brings a wealth of knowledge including business planning, FP&A, corporate finance and operational restructuring.

Stuart has a 1st Class Honours Degree in Mathematics from the University of Warwick and is a Chartered Accountant with The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland.

Crevan O'Grady

Non-Executive Director
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Crevan O'Grady

Crevan has over 20 years investing experience in the UK, continental Europe and the USA. Before founding Volpi Capital, Crevan was a partner at 3i and head of TMT, where he focused on investing in service businesses with international ambitions. Crevan previously served on the boards of directors of numerous private companies across Europe and the USA including Touchtunes, Malmberg, VNU Media and Sparrowhawk Media.

Crevan has a degree in Business and Accounting from Dundee University and is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, and was born and raised in Ireland.


Marco Sodi

Non-Executive Director
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Marco Sodi

Marco has over 30 years’ private equity experience in Europe and the US in information and technology companies. He led the European investing activities of Veronis Suhler (VSS) from their inception in 1999, until 2010. He was a General Partner and member of the Firmwide Investment Committee and has served on numerous portfolio companies boards. Marco joined VSS in the USA in 1988. Prior to this, he spent 5 years in operating roles in the technology industry and 3 years in venture technology investing. Between 2010 and 2016 he was an investor in, and chaired or served on the boards of ITE Group plc, EDSA, Autovista, Metro SA, The Racing Post, Antenna Group and Data Centrum.

Marco has a BS from Cornell University and was born and raised in Florence, Italy.

our people leadership team

Dale Hall

Senior Vice President, Product
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Dale Hall

Dale Hall is the Senior Vice President of Product at Digital Barriers and has been with the company since 2015. Having started his career within the Solutions team, Dale's unique ability to understand customer needs and shape product development led him to swiftly progress into other key roles such a Technical Director for our APAC region and then for our Strategic Partnerships.

Dale is now responsible for all product-related activities such as product vision, strategy, design, marketing and growing the product management function to help drive the long-term business objectives.

Dale has a BSc in Computer Science from Cardiff University.

Dr Graham Herries

Senior Vice President, Engineering & Operations
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Dr Graham Herries

Dr Graham Herries is the Senior Vice President for Engineering and Operations at Digital Barriers, a position he has held since February 2020. He is leading the engineering function and technology direction of the business. He leads the research and development, steers the product roadmap and uses his extensive software leadership experience to shape and grow the engineering capabilities.

Graham has successfully delivered ground-breaking innovation, engineering and transformation projects in defence, aerospace, security, AEC and industrial engineering.

He previously worked for Laing O’Rourke where he provided the executive leadership for the ongoing strategic digital transformation of the organisation. During this period he successfully created and led a project funded by the EU H2020 framework, delivering innovation to the construction and manufacturing sectors through the development of Industry 4.0 technologies for scheduling optimisation, utilising IoT, AI and Digital Twin technologies.

Prior to this role Graham was the Head of the Software Centre of Excellence at Rolls-Royce with a corporate remit to oversee product software, digital strategy and competence of over 1200 engineers globally. Operating in marine, power generation, nuclear and aerospace sectors covering the full range of software development of SIL1-4.

Graham holds a Ph.D. in algorithm development for data classification using statistical classifiers and neural networks (machine learning and data analytics in today’s parlance). He is a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of The Institution of Engineering and Technology(IET). Graham is also a member of the education and skills policy panel at The IET, where, working in a volunteer position, he supports the education and skills agenda to address matters of policy, and public concern from the perspective of the IET. He also sits on several advisory boards for Universities in the UK and is an Honorary Fellow in the School of Computer Science at the University of Nottingham.

Steve Wood

Senior Vice President, Sales
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Steve Wood

Steve Wood is Senior Vice President of Sales. He is responsible for leading our Systems and Security Integrator Partners that operate globally, and those that operate individually in Asia and UK/Europe.

Steve has previously spent over 20 years working for the British Government, within the Ministry of Defence in the UK, US and Germany, as well as on loan to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office for more than 10 years in Asia. With a vast geographic footprint and a flair for cultivating strong business relationships, Steve is central to driving our channel-specific engagement strategies.

Robert Lambert

Chief Scientist
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Robert Lambert

Robert Lambert is the Chief Scientist at Digital Barriers and has been with the company since 2012. Before this he worked as the Chief Technology Officer at a computer software company, and as a Research Fellow at the University of Strathclyde. During his time at the University of Strathclyde, Robert was a part of the team that developed the Orange Videophone, a forerunner of todays’ smartphones.

Robert has a BSc in Electronics and Computer Science from the University of Strathclyde.

Kieron Messer

CTO Video Analytics and Artificial Intelligence
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Kieron Messer

Kieron Messer is the CTO Video Analytics and Artificial Intelligence at Digital Barriers. Highly skilled in Artificial Intelligence, Deep Learning, Software Development and Research and Development (R&D), Kieron is integral to the business and a driving force for innovation and diversification.

Responsible for the design and development of SmartVis Face – Digital Barriers’ ground-breaking eco-system of facial recognition products that work together to include the SmartVis Developer SDK; SmartVis Identifier; SmartVis Face Server; SmartVis Mobile and SmartVis Bodyworn, Kieron is one of the businesses core technology innovators.

Having worked on several EU projects including the Automatic Annotation of Sports Video (ASSAVID) and Biometric Access Control for Networked and e-Commerce Applications (BANCA), he has an extensive history working in the security industry.

Kieron is a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in the field of Image Database Retrieval and holds a Master's degree in Machine Intelligence from the University of Surrey, as well as Bachelor's degree in Physics from Royal Holloway, University of London.

Mark Patrick

Senior Vice President, Americas
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Mark Patrick

Mark Patrick is the Senior Vice President-Americas at Digital Barriers and formerly held the role of Group CTO where he led the research and development for the company’s analytics team and steered the new product development. Mark has extensive experience in delivering AI focused projects for image recognition and biometric identification for defense, intelligence, border control and law enforcement applications.

Having previously worked as a Director at both Ernst & Young and Detica, Mark has extensive skills in program management and large-scale technology delivery.

Mark holds a degree in Software Engineering from the University of Birmingham and is currently based in Washington D.C.

Neil Hendry

Senior Vice President, EMEA
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Neil Hendry

Neil Hendry is Senior Vice President, EMEA at Digital Barriers, previously working at the company as a Technical Director. He has over 25 years of extensive engineering experience and was a member of the British Army for more than 20 of those years, achieving the position of Chief Technical Officer. Neil co-founded telecommunications and surveillance company, Enterprise Technologies (UK) in 2010.

Neil graduated from Cranfield University with a degree in Telecommunications Systems Engineering.



John Sharpe

Senior Vice President, Operations
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John Sharpe

John Sharpe is Senior Vice President, Operations. Responsible for overseeing the operations of the business and translating the company’s strategic objectives into defined operational plans, John has been instrumental in delivering Digital Barriers products and services to customers across the world.

John’s ability to undertake rapid change and build effective teams makes him a leading figure within the business.

John has previously worked at BAE Systems managing highly complex real-time defence programmes, and within the financial services sector at Evolution as COO, and Detica as Business Unit Director.

Hannah Platt

Group Commercial Director
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Hannah Platt

Hannah joined Digital Barriers in March 2013 and was appointed Group Commercial Director in June 2018. She is responsible for all aspects of the Commercial, Legal and HR function.

Prior to joining Digital Barriers, she spent 4 years in at Ernst and Young in the M&A team focused on UK mid-market technology and Life Sciences sector transactions.

She is a qualified Chartered Accountant and holds a MSc in International Management and a BA in Economics and Geography from the University of Exeter.

Events

WEBINAR: Intelligence at the Tactical Edge

Intelligence at the Tactical Edge: How the convergence of distributed compute and intelligent...

21/01/21

3:00 pm

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Our partners

Digital Barriers is a 'Vodafone Business 5G Dig Top 100’ company.

Digital Barriers is a Tomorrow Street
portfolio company

EXPERTISE

True market
disruptors

Digital Barriers brings a new level of value that displaces current trends by improving efficiency and opportunity. Disruptors are innovators, but not all innovators are disruptors, which means, we harness our power, ingenuity and creativity to unlock new possibilities that revolutionise the world in which we live.

CAREER OPPORTUNITIES

Join the team!

At Digital Barriers every role matters and only through our team of brilliant, visionary and like-minded individuals are we able to deliver products, solutions and a culture we can truly be proud off. We pride ourselves on building and environment of learning, collaboration and innovation that challenges our staff and other key stakeholders to think beyond the immediate, but to a bright and fearless future.

We are always looking for talented, passionate and inspiring individuals to join our growing team, and with roles in Engineering & Design, Project Management, Finance & Commercial, Sales, Marketing & Communications and Human Resources across three continents – you may find the perfect career opportunity.

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