Born 1953, Paul Hardy graduated in 1975 with a M.A. in Computer Science from Cambridge University in England. He worked for 28 years at Laser-Scan Ltd in Cambridge England, where he held the roles of Chief Programmer, Product Manager, and Principal Consultant.
He was Product Manager for Cartography at Esri in Redlands California from 2003 to 2006, and project managed the implementation of advanced cartographic capabilities into ArcGIS. From 2007 he was Business Development Consultant for Esri Europe, focused on national mapping and cadastral agencies. He retired in 2016, other than for occasional consultancy.
He is a Chartered Engineer, a Fellow of the British Cartographic Society and a Member of the British Computer Society. His professional interests include digital mapping and charting, automated cartography, map generalization, geospatial data models and data re-engineering techniques. Because of his time in business development and in software development, he bridges the communication gap between business users and technical professionals.