UK: Partrac Celebrates 10th Anniversary

Expert marine data acquisition and consultancy company Partrac Ltd, is celebrating its 10th anniversary.

The three founding directors Kevin Black, Peter Wilson and Sam Athey, started the business in 2003 sitting around a table with just a pen, a notebook and a telephone. Partrac now has a solid reputation for delivering high quality data to clients and an enviable (and growing) client portfolio that includes the US Navy, Scottish Power Renewables and Westminster Boskalis. It also now has 22 staff and a warehouse full of the latest marine technology, including a number of innovative and unique marine instruments and technologies.

Partrac operates across a number of sectors including offshore renewables, the water industry, the ports and harbours sector, and the dredging industry. Athey says ‘key to our success is being client focused, responding to clients’ needs and helping them design their projects so that their data objectives can be met in the safest, most efficient and cost-effective way. Good, quality data is very powerful.’

Originally formed to provide particle tracking (hence the name ‘par-trac’) and sediment monitoring services, it soon became apparent that opportunities existed outside the geomarine area; the skills required to understand and monitor the tidal currents and waves were also highly sought after. ‘We invested in both good people and quite a lot of equipment and developed services to measure and monitor the most challenging physical oceanography’, says Wilson. ‘This led to successes in monitoring all of the offshore wind developments in Scottish territorial waters, as well as others around England and Wales. We have also recently completed our 50th deployment for wave and tidal projects, which means we have undertaken monitoring for 90% of UK sites’. Partrac is now a leading provider of monitoring and data acquisition solutions for physical oceanography in Europe.

Success has also been achieved in the United States. Black says ‘we have attended a number of events in the US focusing on issues around sediment movement and sediment impacts since 2004. This has directly led to commissions for the US Navy, the US Army Corps of Engineers and the US Geological Survey, amongst others. We have been involved in projects in the Florida Everglades, Hawaii, San Diego, and Seattle’. Partrac is currently involved in a $500K particle tracking and sediment tracing study for the US Navy in San Diego. Back in the UK, Partrac is completing a 3.5 year long programme of environmental (water quality) monitoring for one of the largest and most prestigious dredging projects in Europe.

Following significant investment in equipment and technical staff, Partrac has now invested in a Business Development Manager for the first time. George Smith has 25 years industry related experience and joined Partrac at the beginning of September. Smith says ‘I was not only tempted by the reputation of quality and technical expertise that Partrac has, but by the entrepreneurial vision of the Directors. I look forward to helping them achieve their ambitions’.

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Press release, September 24, 2013; Image: partrac