About us

Drift+Noise Polar Services GmbH is a spin-off company of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI). The founders look back on more than 15 years of operational experience in polar regions.

Drift+Noise is fully committed to assisting stakeholders acting in polar waters with operational ice information from models and satellites, by leveraging technology from polar research, geophysics, and remote sensing.

We are looking for early-adopters in the marine and polar market who are presently investing in the digitization of their operations. We integrate Agile and DevOps practices to ensure the high quality of our operational services; concepts such as code revision, test driven development, and continuous integration are used in our daily workflow.

Key users of our services include icebreakers like Polarstern (the German national icebreaker operated by the AWI) and Aurora Australis (chartered by the Australian Antarctic Division), expedition cruise companies such as Hapag Lloyd Cruises and Marine Technology and Engineering Organisations like the Hamburg Ship Model Basin (HSVA).

Video Portraits of Drift+Noise Polar Services

Portrait by the Copernicus Marine Service

Bremen's Buten un Binnen accompanied our team while we were supporting the research icebreaker Polarstern in Antarctica. (in German)

The team members are:

Lasse Rabenstein

Business Development and Consulting

Lasse holds a PhD in geophysics and is founder of the first generation. He takes care of the sustainable growth of the company and consults polar expeditions on-site and remotely.

Paul Cochrane

Development and Operations

Paul holds a PhD in physics and is a software developer by heart. He manages the devops processes in the company.

Alexandra Stocker

Marketing

Alexandra holds a M.Sc. in coastal and marine management and joined the team in December 2020. She is responsible for the marketing of the IcySea app, for which she keeps a close relationship with the IcySea users.

Hannah Jansen

Administration

Hannah holds a M.Sc. in Sustainability Economics and Management and joined us in 2022. She is responsible for the coordination of our different projects and takes care of administrational matters in our Bremen office.

Henning Weidenhöfer

Software Development

Henning recently joined our IcySea development team. He has two decades of experience in developing web applications and digital solutions.

H. Jakob Belter

Research and Operational Field Support

Jakob holds a PhD in physics with a focus on sea ice. He coordinates research and consults clients in the field.

Bernhard Schmitz

Software Development

Bernhard is a geophysicist and professional software engineer. He is the driving force behind the IcySea progressive web application.

Taib Hayat

Development and Operations

Taib is a geographer and a web developer. At Drift+Noise he focuses mainly on backend programming and devops processes.

Matthias Hegmann

Feature Development

Matthias holds a B.Sc. in Geodesy and Geoinformatics and joined us in 2022 as a working student. He supports the frontend development of our IcySea app.

Advisory board members are:

Panagiotis Kountouris

Scientist at ECMWF

Panagiotis is one of our co-founders and is currently employed by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. His expertise includes remote sensing, model data processing, and scientific software development.

Matthias Verbeke

Entrepreneur

Matthias is one of our co-founders. He serves on the board of directors of Open Analytics and assists Drift+Noise in legal and regulatory matters.

Bjørn Kay

Master Mariner and Ice Advisor

Bjørn is employed by the Svendborg International Maritime Academy and is a master mariner, ice instructor, ice advisor, and member of the International Ice Charting Group Task Team 8.