CV and Portfolio

Hardware and firmware engineering

  • Hardware: CE- and FCC-compliant mixed-signal schematic design and PCB layout (Altium Designer and Zuken Cadstar).
  • Firmware: specialities are C, ARM assembler, and DSP development. I’ve delivered many solo and team-based firmware projects.
  • I’ve built commercial projects using VHDL, C++ (JUCE), C#, XC, and a lot of other languages. I’m familiar with the usual tools for safe collegiate working (SVN, Git).
  • Music tech is where I learned my trade. I’m a classically-trained pianist, so it’s been a good way to deploy those skills. At least four of my products have featured as a Sound On Sound cover image.

Generally looking after people

  • I started a business that, from 2021, makes head trackers and ships its products worldwide, doing so amid a number of extraordinary macroeconomic headwinds.
  • I worked at ROLI as de facto VP of Engineering until around 2015, and was a hardware team leader at Focusrite: recruiting, orienting, and managing teams; maintaining a programme of R&D projects; mentoring junior developers; keeping the wheels on the train.
  • I looked after ROLI’s intellectual property portfolio, including identifying, preparing, and maintaining patents and registered trademarks.
  • I’ve successfully convened a widely-adopted specification (MPE), chaired industry-wide committees (including the UK AES Section), and work well with other engineers and stakeholders.
  • Here’s my LinkedIn profile.

Some things I’ve helped to make

PWM Mantis (2024)

  • Hybrid synth with digital oscillators and effects, and analogue filter and drive. Design started by the late Chris Huggett, and finished by me.
  • Sensitively took a proof of concept to manufacturability. Reduced cost, got rid of digital artifacts, and doubled the instrument’s polyphony whilst keeping to Chris Huggett’s vision. Schematic/PCB layout, firmware [C], DSP, CE/FCC compliance, factory testing/calibration software [C++/JUCE].

Supperware Head Tracker (2021)

  • Adds head movement cues to any set of headphones. This lets sound designers and producers make and demonstrate mixed-reality/immersive audio experiences without having to surround themselves with loudspeakers or deal with a full VR headset.
  • Low cost, high accuracy, high speed, and comfortable.
  • Sales into four figures, and a large ecosystem of compatible third-party software in addition to my own.
  • A terrific industrial designer assisted with the product appearance and presentation.
  • Also filed a patent.
  • The website is here.

Seaboard GRAND (2014)

  • ROLI’s flagship synthesiser with a unique, expressive playable surface.
  • DSP and firmware for the control surface [C on ARM and TI C5000 DSP].
  • A Linux daemon to handle MIDI traffic.
  • Initial specification for the Equator synthesiser engine.
  • Recruiting, then initially orienting and managing, the team that worked on Equator, the Linux system, and subsequent ROLI products.
  • Assisting the patent attorney to prepare and file patents.

Some things I’ve published

  • See the academic publications page for scholarly works.
  • The MPE specification. I chaired the working group and edited the document (meaning that I wrote more than half of it, but I cannot say exactly how much). To view the specification is free, but requires registration with The MIDI Association.
  • The Focusrite Development Blog, years ago, but it did include an entertaining post about the ZX Spectrum that went viral (front page on Slashdot and The Register; >10,000 page views in a week).
  • I have had articles published in Journal of the Audio Engineering Society and International Pro Sound News.
  • YouTube has videos of my ADC talks, which I’ve delivered every year since 2016 on subjects including MIDI, spatial audio, and hardware design.

Everything* else I’ve helped to make

*well, almost.