John Davies
Senior Researcher @Initiative & Institute For Interstellar Studies
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WORK HISTORY
Senior Researcher @Initiative & Institute For Interstellar Studies
London, GB
An enthusiastic pro bono worker for The Initiative for Interstellar Studies (and board member 20••••24). Active in support of its goals of Interstellar communication and travel. Edited magazine Principium for 10 years / 41 issues ending August 2024. Succeeded by Gill Norman (linkedin.com/in/gill-norman-nee-barber-ba51bb12).Currently working on a variety of projects for the Initiative and in its Academy - specifically its outreach to primary and secondary education. Editing the i4is quarterly, Principium.Coordinated the presence of the Initiative at Loncon3, the 2014 World Science Fiction Convention working with Gill Norman, organised an exhibition stand and a half-day set of presentations.Devised the Interstellar Challenge for London Schools. Worked with Aasiya Hassan, STEM Ambassador Coordinator at STEM Learning UK, to organise the 2016 Challenge at Imperial College supported by Imperial College Outreach, ICSEDS and the British Interplanetary Society.Delivered \"Skateboards to Starships\" at the Royal Institution (with Satinder Shergill) 2018 - invited to re-run and expand in 2019 - delivered again in 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025 (twice}.
EDUCATION
University of Liverpool
B. Eng., Electronics
The University of Manchester
M.Sc., Computer Science
SKILLS
ABOUT JOHN DAVIES
John graduated from the University of Liverpool in 1968 with a degree in Electronics. He worked in the Space Projects division of Hawker Siddeley Dynamics (now Airbus Defence and Space) in Stevenage, notably on pre-launch checkout systems for the Bluestreak first stage of the ELDO rocket and on a design study for an astronomical telescope payload for the planned Space Shuttle, subsequently named Hubble. He moved to the University of Edinburgh Computer Centre (ERCC) where he wrote real-time software for early packet switching networks, contributed to hardware design for high-speed data links and did a Masters in Computer Science at Manchester University. He moved to the University of London Computer Centre in 1979 to join a new team building networks for the supercomputer service. John returned to the commercial sector in 1986 at Data Logic as a communications consultant contracting to companies including Mitsubishi and Philips. He managed a team of communications specialists developing standards for applications programming interfaces in UNIX for X/Open, now The Open Group. He moved to Hutchison Mobile Data, a pioneer packet radio network, working in technical sales support and standards including GPRS (now part of most mobile networks). He moved to Sema Telecommunications, developers of the first SMS store and forward system - again in technical sales and standards including extensions to SMS. In John joined a pioneer mobile payment company, MobileAge, for its brief life. In the years just before retiring he managed IT4Communities, a charitable programme of the Information Technologists Company, a City of London Livery Company. He was briefly involved with Movirtu, a virtual mobile identity startup, now part of Blackberry. He now has a near full-time pro bono role, back in space technology, doing educational outreach for the Initiative for Interstellar Studies (i4is.org), and editing its quarterly, Principium (tinyurl.com/principium) from 2015 to 2025.UMAN: GO
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