Our Story

In 2011, Sylvain was searching the Atlantic for the missing Air France 447 aircraft. A few years later, he and his team were on a mission to map the D-Day wrecks in the English channel. In both cases he regretted the inability to visualize underwater data at scale and believed that tools should exist to meet this need.   

A mutual colleague introduced him to Matthieu, engineer and entrepreneur with decades of experience in data visualization. It only took a first meeting for Sylvain to conclude that together, they could build the necessary software .  

With the help of an expert team of software engineers, designers and data analysts, Sylvain and Matthieu pioneered Nine North – a full ocean simulator enabling operators anywhere in the world to prepare and monitor their deep ocean fieldwork from a desktop computer.   

Two years later, following intensive development and testing, the product is ready for use.

Sylvain Pascaud

CEO

Nine North is the brainchild of Sylvain’s experience as both deep ocean explorer and filmmaker. 

Sylvain Pascaud began his career at the French marine institute Ifremer as a crewmember on the Nautile research submarine. From there, he was recruited by the Cousteau Society as an underwater cameraman and commercial diver on several Calypso expeditions. He then went on to found Libre Comme l'Air (LCL) Production, a documentary film production company specialized in adventure, science and technology.

In this role, Pascaud produced or directed more than 75 films and TV series which aired on the Discovery Channel, Channel 4, National Geographic, ARD, France Television, NHK, and many others.  

Highlights of his career include the Titanic 96 expedition, the first scientific investigation to reveal what had happened to the structure of the great ship. The three-part series Titanic: Anatomy of a Disaster was aired worldwide.  

In 2003, Sylvain Pascaud was appointed project manager by Airbus to produce an international television series on the design, construction, flight test and delivery of the A380, the world’s largest commercial airliner. He was later instrumental in several phases of the search for AF 447 the doomed Rio to Paris flight which disappeared for more than 600 days in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Pascaud managed the final phase of the search project that resulted in finding the debris field in 2011.  

Pascaud was also expedition leader and project manager of D Day’s ’s Sunken Secrets, a two-month underwater expedition to survey wrecks off the coast of Normandy. This project was also a tribute to veterans for the 70th anniversary of the Normandy landing in 2014. D-Day. The documentary film, a tribute to WWII veterans, marked the 70th anniversary of the Normandy landing and was aired in more than 20 countries. 

Matthieu Straub

CTO

With degrees in cinematography and image engineering, Matthieu’s entire career has been dedicated to developing new technologies for the creative sector. He has founded 5 companies and contributed to over 100 commercials and 15 feature films.  

Matthieu began his career as a Digital Imaging Engineer at TSF GROUP where contributed to the development of the first 4K digital cinema camera, helping accelerate the film industry's shift from analog to digital. Matthieu's first venture into data visualization came when he co-founded Yojik GIS, a novel tool for monitoring vineyards in South Africa using the NDVI Index.

His other ventures include Be4Post SAS, which provides VFX mobile post-production stations and tools onsite and FilmLight, offering innovative post-production technologies for feature films worldwide. More recently, Matthieu co-founded Metta SAS, a company creating immersive experiences through virtual reality.  

As co-Founder and CTO of Nine North Inc, Mathieu is using his unique blend skills to develop a 4D digital twin of the ocean floor, along with a talented team of software engineers and designers.