After five years at the helm as Managing Director, Andy Webb steps down and hands the baton over to Martin Scott. Andy became MD at HiDef in 2017 and has worked through a period of substantial growth at the company bringing science to the fore.
From being a keen birder, leading to working at Seabirds at Sea, Andy has become a well-known name in both ornithological and renewable energy circles. Ornithology became a long career at JNCC managing advice on seabirds and cetaceans, with particular emphasis on development of a network of marine Special Protection Areas. He has worked on development of statistical analysis techniques for assessing population size and identifying boundaries for SPAs; management of data and its dissemination to stakeholders. Events to be particularly proud of include the design of over 60 marine SPAs, including successful classification of 42 of these and the creation of the ESAS surveyor training programme. Latterly he developed advice on options for monitoring seabirds and cetaceans in UK waters to meet statutory and international obligations.
Moving to HiDef Andy gained the responsibility of managing the resources of the company as it began to grow. Through this period turnover has seen significant expansion and new partnerships formed not least expanding the relationship with sister company BioConsult in Germany. Alongside his management works Andy has always retained a strong interest in the scientific quality at HiDef and has worked on multiple consultancy and research projects. These include research into seabird flight height, use of digital aerial surveys as a means of marine wildlife surveying and authoring multiple reports and papers.
Andy won’t be disappearing altogether, and he will still be involved in HiDef going forward as a part time advisor. I’m sure you will all join us in wishing him all the best with his future plans and to thank him for all his guidance, advice, input and commitment during his time at HiDef.
