About Us

Our specific focus is on spatial situational awareness and its real-time applications for end-user requirements, both short and longer term. We are a studio with private and public sector clients in Rail, Maritime, Smart Cities across Europe, from zero to post revenue, already recognised in the industry in 18 months.

Key Personnel Biographies

Robert Sugar

Robert Sugar

Founder

Visualisation expert, data scientist: smart cities, 5G, maritime. Space entrepreneur, futurist.

uk.linkedin.com/in/robertsugar

   robert.sugar@urbanhawk.space

Robert is a trained Physicist and veteran of the data and creative industries.

Urban Hawk is his latest spin off from the foundations of the past. Fusing the variety of his team's and his own collective scientific and commercial skills to a specific focus on spatial situational awareness and its real-time applications.

He was born in Hungary, where he retains a strong network of academic and commercial contacts. His first venture - at the age of 22 - was Mithis Entertainment, the designer and developer of "Nexus: the Jupiter Incident" and the WW2 naval game "Battlestations: Midway". Has consulted on a number of visual schemes for VR, and space based satellite imagery projects. Then he founded Crocotta R&D in 2013 in the UK and captained the company to success in a range of applied science contracts. Milestones included a breakthrough in automation for Pharmaceutical Microscopes and a visualisation initiative for the EDRS launch at the European Space Agency (ESA). Ongoing work with sister company, N-Ware, enabled consolidation of other core contracts in data management, notably with blue chip clients like BMW and Siemens.

He is currently based in Bristol, with commutes to London, Birmingham and the continent or wherever the work takes him. A registered assessor and panelist for Innovate UK, he is frequently called upon to examine the merits of new proposals that advance the course of science and business in the UK and Europe.

A father of three, he enjoys taking his family for walks so that the work / life balance is applied and he can keep fit! Active in his local community (recently appointed skills adviser for West of England and a frequent guest of the great and good at Westminster), he also enjoys reading, watching and even writing science fiction.

John Tapsfield

John Tapsfield

CTO & Business Development lead

uk.linkedin.com/in/johntapsfield

   john.tapsfield@urbanhawk.space

John is a trained Project Manager & veteran of the tech & creative industries – graduating from Central St Martins before pivoting into Drupal web development, web design and later project and product management.

John joins us as our CTO - where his role is to bridge the gap between technological capability and client need – whether this is on product requirements, experience design, graphic user interface design and assessing the technical feasibility and suitability of different competing solutions. His strong background in product management and unique experiences on spatial situational awareness and its real-time applications for the UK Fire Service is highly relevant to the development of the Situational Awareness applications of Polaron – but his broad experience includes: Connected Car Applications for Porsche, Tax Calculators, IOT systems, High Value Car Auction Systems, multi-system micro service architectures, as well as SLAM and other emerging technologies ranging from Ai enabled crop solutions tools for DOW chemical, or driving the release of the most cost effective smart heating and monitoring network in the UK.

John also leads on some of the project delivery functions and is Prince 2 qualified, as well as experienced in agile, waterfall and similar methods.

John works closely with the CEO to map and ensure delivery on product requirements, scope potential partners and solutions and manages the interfaces into 3rd party tools and data systems.

Erika Fucsok

Erika Fucsok

Economist and Data Scientist

   erika.fucsok@urbanhawk.space

Erika is a trained economist and data scientist and our in house expert on both macro and micro implications for a client’s business as they move forward with us. Her specialism is applying the ‘big’ ideas of corporate markets to small and medium enterprise models in innovative ways. She is also experienced in automation and its commercial implications.

Erika will review every case and associated report, ensuring we communicate an accessible market vision. In her own words ‘The provision of data is just the beginning: it is the economic application of that tool which is the difference between success and failure in today’s changing marketplaces’.

A busy working mother with 3 girls at home, Erika enjoys baking cakes, dancing and aerobics as well as travel on the continent, schedule permitting.

James Murphy

James Murphy

(former) Co-founder, Strategy and Communications

James was a consulting Director at Urban Hawk; a futurist, thinker and brainstormer. He was instrumental in the company’s transition from pilot initiative to fully fledged working operation.

James began working at Crocotta R&D in 2014, brokering deals with the European Space Agency and securing membership of the Entrepreneurs for the Future (E4F) programme.

A graduate of New College, Oxford and the College (now University) of Law, James is a qualified Arbitrator and has taught and lectured in a number of sectors.

He has a passion for cinema. He has advised top filmmakers on casting and thematic touches in scripts and his editorials at movieviral.com are well regarded. You might find James in his spare time on Park Runs and at British Military Fitness (BMF), sometimes raising money for charities (RNIB, Royal British Legion, Edwards’ Trust) along the way.