Our team
Elsa Nicol
CEO, CO-FOUNDER
Since 2019, Falco's foundation, Elsa has been leading the company's strategy with a clear mission: to facilitate the necessary technological evolution of marinas while preserving their cultural identity and enhancing the boating experience in a sustainable way.
Engineer graduated from INSA, Elsa has trained in management and entrepreneurship at the University of California - Berkeley, the London Business School and the EM Lyon Business School. For over 10 years, Elsa lead the development of high-tech products in the maritime, aerospace and defense sectors in the USA, UK and Scandinavia.
Beyond her industry expertise and management experience, Elsa brings to Falco her sense of strategy, a pragmatic, results-oriented approach as well as resilience and optimisme.
Quentin Bey
CTO
Paola Galvan Tornel
VP OF SALES
Telecoms engineer graduated from ECE and Sorbonne, Paola has over 10 years of experience in business development in the field of telecoms and new technologies.
After five years managing teams in engineering consulting, she has been leading teams and projects on digital challenges, notably at Google.
Albin BILLOCHON
DIRECTOR of OPERATIONS & SUPPORT
Albin has over 25 years of experience in the marine sector. He worked as a sailing instructor, boat preparer and after-sales service manager. He brings Falco his industry knowledge and his background in customer relationship.
Thomas Watteyne
SCIENTIFIC ADVISOR, CO-FOUNDER
Thomas is an internationally recognized expert in the field of low-power wireless mesh networks. He supports Wattson Elements as a scientific advisor.
Thomas has deployed more than 1,000 sensors on three continents. He leads a research team at Inria Paris and works as a network architect at Analog Devices, leader of its market.
Thomas is leading the standardization of this technology with 6TiSCH group at IETF. His goal is to allow this branch of IoT to grow in a secured and optimized environment, in various sectors of the industry.
Anna Bednárik
PROJECT MANAGER
Trained translator, Anna worked as a research team assistant at Inria.
She joined Falco at the end of 2020 as an Office Manager. More recently she has taken on responsibilities as a Project Manager.
Maxime Bihannic
Sales manager
Maxime graduated as a materials engineer and worked as a business manager in a digital services company before joining Falco. Attracted by the challenge of being a sales manager in a growing company, Maxime is dedicated to business development activities while participating in the definition of Falco's evolving offer.
Jonas Schneider
SALES MANAGER, FALCO AMERICAS CORP.
French, American and Swiss, with degrees from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore and EDHEC Business School, Jonas accompanies Falco in its growth in the United States.
With over 10 years of sailing experience and love for the nautical world, Jonas is convinced of Falco's solution and is eager to take part in the connected transition of marinas.
Trifun Savic
R&D - PhD ENGINEER RESEARCHER
My main role as an R&D Engineer at Wattson Elements - Falco is to design and develop low-power IoT products and devices for smart marinas. Moreover, I participate in the definition of the technical and functional characteristics of the solutions and provide with internal/external technical assistance.
Passionate about applied research and motivated by new challenges, Trifun started a CIFRE thesis in the framework of a partnership between Falco and Inria Paris.
Benoît Besnard
PARTNER,É - RESPONSABLE DU DIGITAL
Benoit graduated with a degree in fine arts (beaux-arts) and accumulated 20+ years of experience on web development. Benoit's career path has been divided between advertising agencies (Publicis Etoile), consulting firms (Capgemini), and startup creation and independent consulting.
The variety of missions on which he was able to work on allowed him to have a genuine global digital expertise: User Experience (UX), User Interface (UI), customer journey, customer relationship, digital marketing, social media and e-business are the core elements of his expertise alongside our clients.œur de son expertise au service de nos clients.
Lila Gazeau
INGENIEURE FRONT-END
Lila is a computer engineer from IMAC Paris (Image - Multimedia - Audiovisual - Communication) and joined Falco after a successful first professional experience. As a member of the Y generation, she brings her web culture and her vision of uses. Delighted to integrate a multidisciplinary team, she will discover the yachting sector with enthusiasm.
Emmanuel Sandorfi
INGENIEUR BACK-END
Emmanuel has always designed applications for large and small companies, in France and in the USA. He comes from a family of IBM engineers. His passion for serving the community naturally led him to joining Wattson Elements, where he contributes to the development and reliability of the digital ecosystem of marinas.
Keoma Laguna
CO-FOUNDER, TECHNOLOGICAL CONSULTANT
With a PhD in computer science from Paris, specializing in wireless computer networks, Dr Keoma Laguna participated in the implementation of numerous data collection systems in three continents. Curious and motivated, he brings his knowledge in deploying high reliability wireless networks to meet the new challenges faced by marinas.
Olivier Laporte
CO-FONDATEUR & CONSEIL MARITIME
Olivier is a Captain and an Environmental Engineer. He has been committed to the sustainable development of the maritime environment for over 20 years.
Project and expedition leader for major scientific (CNRS, CEA, Conservatoire du Littoral) and technical (Ecotank, Monaco Marine) actors, Olivier provides Wattson Elements with his maritime expertise, network and enthusiasm.
Oliver specialized in environmental marina management. He is convinced that Falco's solution will allow marinas to be more efficient and resilient thanks to the combination of the digital and ecological transition.
Jim Lamarche
ASSOCIATE MEMBER, NORTH AMERICA
Jim combines a unique entrepreneurial background as the co-founder and CEO of an AI startup as well as being a small business owner and commercial tuna captain. Prior to branching out on his own, he spent 16 years at Cisco Systems in Sales, Business Development, Corp Finance, and Channel Management. Along with his love for the water, he is passionate about creating unique solutions and building value for his customers.
Manon Gasnier
UX/UI DESIGNER (WORK-STUDY CONTRACT)
Manon studied digital project management and worked as junior project manager in an agency. She works on the digital interface conception for Falco.