With the end of the year in sight and a new one almost upon us, we’ve been taking a step back to reflect on what a phenomenal year it has been for STRYDE, with a number of key highlights, successes and milestones, all preparing us for a great start to 2023.
In this blog post, we caught up with STRYDE’s CEO, Mike Popham, to find out why 2022 has been a pivotal year for the business, what his highlights have been, and what he is hoping STRYDE will be able to achieve in the next year…
How has this year been for STRYDE?
“2022 has been a really good year for us as a business - last year was really special but this year has been even better.
“We reached one of our key milestones in September when we surpassed 100 projects. We’re already up to 114 which is fantastic as when we have only been delivering systems for just over 2 years now. Another important milestone we achieved this year was the delivery of our 500,000th node in October, a figure which we have gone well above since then.
“Right now alone, we have 260,000 nodes recording in Oman, which gives you a feel for the scale at which STRYDE are now operating at. We've seen a huge uptake across the Middle East market, which is encouraging.
“From an internal perspective, it’s been a great year for us in terms of our team. We’ve had 10 new people join who are all super talented and nice to work with, which we’re delighted about. That takes us up to 63 people in the team altogether. Most of our staff are based in London, Oslo, Houston and Dubai, although we do have members of the team even further afield.”
What have been your highlights of 2022?
“Back in March, we all went to Barcelona to meet up as a team. It was a fantastic trip because it was the first time we had all met in person. Even though I’ve been working with some team members for just over 2 years, the pandemic prevented us from meeting in person. It was really nice to get everyone together, and it was a successful trip (apart from some bad karaoke)!
“It’s also been great getting out and meeting people in person, seeing old friends and making new acquaintances. My favourite conference of the year was IMAGE in Houston - it was fantastic to see so many people from the seismic community coming together in one place again. We had a lot of fun on our STRYDE stand as well - we had a STRYDE node foosball tournament set up and actually used our nodes as the players. It was really good fun to take on all the visitors at our stand and see who would be our foosball champion!
“Another area that I’m very proud of is the recent opening of our multi-purpose warehouse and training facility in Dubai, and it’s capable of housing well over one million STRYDE Nodes™, so that’s a very exciting prospect for us in the future and will be key to servicing our clients in the Middle East, Africa and the ASPAC region.”
How have you helped your customers overcome challenges this year?
“We always find that our customers are delighted with the speed improvements and ultimately, the large image uplift that STRYDE enables when acquiring new land seismic data. However, we also learned that the same customers were frustrated with the slow seismic data processing services on offer from the market. This meant that while STRYDE had helped transform their seismic acquisitions, they still couldn’t use newly acquired data to make decisions quickly enough.
“We wanted to fix this challenge for our customers, so in May we launched our seismic data processing offering, with a focus on delivering high quality, fast track products. The team have been flat out with projects ever since!”
Why do you believe STRYDE is changing the game for land seismic?
“STRYDE allows our users to acquire the seismic that they want to, rather than having to make compromises, trading off cost, quality, and HSSE risks - which is the case when using alternative systems.
“This year, I have been fortunate to see our technology in use around the world. It is always rewarding talking to both the seismic crews and their end clients who can immediately see the improvements in field operations that STRYDE delivers. Due to the small size of our nodes and their low price point, it means that crews using STRYDE are always faster, even when we lay out more nodes in line and that surveys can be delivered with far fewer people and vehicles.”
What’s coming next for STRYDE in 2023?
“It’s going to be another huge year for us. We’ve got our sights set on delivering our millionth node. I’m quietly confident that 2023 will be the year we achieve this.
“There is also a lot of opportunity to continue to help with exploration and monitoring for CCUS (Carbon Capture, Utilisation, and Storage), geothermal and mining. Two years ago, we were only just starting to talk about the difference we could make to these market sectors. Fast forward to now and around half of the 114 seismic projects we have enabled are for new energy markets. I am confident our technology will continue to support the global energy transition in 2023 and beyond. ”