Our client has its roots in rocket science… literally. Since the first image was collected from space over 30 years ago by classified government imaging systems, only a limited number of people have been permitted access to highly detailed photos of the Earth, and the industry was tightly regulated. Since its deregulation in the 1990’s, our client is changing this historical usage of Earth information through the commercialization of high-resolution satellite imaging and an innovative approach to conducting business with customers, partners and resellers. The company was founded in 1992 to launch satellites into space for the purpose of taking high-resolution photos of the earth for defense and intelligence, government, and commercial use. In early 2000, the US government awarded its first significant contract for satellite imagery to the firm. Currently, the company offers the world’s highest resolution commercial satellite imagery, the largest image size, and the greatest on-board storage capacity of any satellite imagery provider. In addition, the company’s comprehensive ImageLibrary houses the most up-to-date images available.
In 2004, our client struck an exclusive portal agreement to supply much of its satellite imagery to Google’s new product launch, branded Google Earth. This deal served as both validation for a broader explicit push as well as anchor tenant into the non-federal government, commercial sector.
The company is headquartered near Boulder, Colorado, with other offices and facilities in key geographies throughout the world. Commercial division headquarters are in Needham, MA.
The company filed for an Initial Public Offering in June of 2008.
Popular business and technology soothsaying magazines have trumpeted mapping as the next “killer app.”
Image-enhanced mapping – typically associated with markets based on GIS and GPS - have now begun to penetrate the mainstream lexicon. Use of satellite imagery is definitely no longer the exclusive province of the intelligence community but is broadly used by business and the consumer as well. [Even somewhat capricious mapping use has taken off like wildfire, as evidenced by the overnight popularity of photo posting sites like Flickr that tag location coordinates to each image.]
Based on market data from ASPRS and Frost & Sullivan, the estimated global addressable market for sub-1 meter imagery (including aerial) is $680M. The combination of strong underlying growth in the traditional (GIS-based) market, and new emerging web-based applications will increase the addressable imagery market to more than $1B in 2010. Very high resolution commercial satellite imagery is expected to be the major growth driver, taking share from aerial imagery providers.
The Vice President of Sales, Americas will be responsible for managing the overall sales plan, associated P&L and budget for the commercial sales group in the U.S., Canada, and South America. The VP Sales, Americas (VPSA) reports to the CEO. The position and associated team is focused on driving new sales into commercial markets, including but not limited to industry sectors including Oil & Gas, Telecom, Utilities, Online Mapping & Portals, Consumer Navigation, and the broadly defined corporate enterprise.
As the Company is headquartered in Longmont, Colorado, just outside of Boulder, Colorado, this position will be based at Headquarters offices.
The successful candidate must possess excellent organizational skills and the ability to lead a multi-continent distributed sales, business development and sales support organization. Specific sales leadership background is in the broad-based area of web-based content. He or she must have experience establishing and managing one and two tier distribution sales structures internationally.
The Americas sales team is comprised of approximately 16 dedicated staff, including regional sales managers and directors (~6), business development (2), and sales support staff (8). A Sales operations group of approximately 20 is shared between the various sales organizations, including the Americas, EMEA, and APAC regions.
Highlights of the VPSA responsibilities include:
Commercial Business Unit offices exist with headquarters in Longmont, CO, and other offices in Colorado, Boston area, Singapore, and the United Kingdom. The sales team is comprised of 4 regional Director/VPsThere are Regional Sales Managers, for a total of approximately a 5, including all sales VPs, Directors and Managers.
The largest shareholder in the Company is Morgan Stanley, occupying several seats on the board. During its seed and growth stages, the company has also received venture capital (August Capital), private equity (Frontera), and strategic investments (Ball Corp’s aerospace division).
Compensation will be competitive with the position’s requirements, comprised of three basic components-- base salary, incentive compensation driven by a combination of achieving revenue targets and management-by-objective milestones, and appropriate equity stakeholder position.