OUR CORE TEAM
Back on earth
David
Henri
Chief Executive Officer Cofounder
David started Exotrail project when he was studying at Ecole polytechnique. David holds an engineering and corporate strategy degree from Ecole polytechnique, the leading university for science in France. He completed his education with a Master Degree from the University of Cambridge in Industrial Systems, Manufacture and Management. David has an experience in the French Air Force and has been working at Swiss Space Systems, a New Space start-up which designed a suborbital launcher for small satellites. He had an engineer role in the Propulsion department. He then worked in a Corporate Venture Capital (ENGIE New Ventures). David is President & CEO of Exotrail and leads Exotrail’s vision and global execution.
Nicolas
Heitz
Chief Operating Officer Cofounder
Nicolas holds an Aerospace Master in Science Degree from ISAE-ENSMA, a Business Degree from ESSEC & Centrale Paris and a Financial Certificate from HEC Paris. Nicolas acquired a highly valuable experience in management during his 6-year job at ALTRAN, managing critical projects and large teams, then reorganization projects, as a Presales manager. Passionate with entrepreneurship, he cofounded, structured and developed his first start-up, Adionics as VP Finance & Administration. After 5+ years, more than 5M€ of fundings and a lot of successes, he decided to join Exotrail project and is now one of the 4 cofounders. Nicolas brings his entrepreneurship experience and his skills in finance, administration and operations as COO of Exotrail.
Jean-Luc
Maria
Chief Technology Officer Cofounder
Jean-Luc is an aerospace engineer (he holds an aerospace engineering degree from ISAE-SupAero) and has been a space project manager for 16 years at CNRS (French National Research Centre). He has a system engineering background, and became technical project manager on solar system exploration missions (Venus Express, ExoMars, BepiColombo …). He has been involved at various stages of a space payload development, from call biding to realization, testing and delivery. He has then been responsible of an AIT (Assembly, Integration & Tests) platform for space hardware integration and qualification. Thanks to these experiences, he has a wide and comprehensive knowledge of the space hardware development cycle, together with an extensive network in the space industry worldwide. Jean-Luc is our Chief Technical Officer and leads the overall product development of ExoMG®-Nano and ExoMG®- Micro.
Paul
Lascombes
Chief Scientific Officer Cofounder
Paul holds an engineering degree from Ecole polytechnique and an aerospace
engineering degree from ISAE-Supaero in Toulouse. He started Exotrail during
his study at Polytechnique with David. Paul is an aerospace enthusiast and a
licensed pilot. He has a strong aerospace experience that he acquired during
various internships at Caltech (California), Swiss Space Systems and more
recently at Airbus Defence & Space in the Advanced Systems team.
Paul has the role of Mission Manager and R&D director at Exotrail. He is
specifically responsible of all the space mechanics and manoeuvres aspects
of Exotrail.
Bastien
Duong
Systems
Engineer
Bastien graduated with an international double master degree in 'Industrial Automation' at the University of Brescia (Brescia, Italy) and 'Mechatronic Systems for Rehabilitation' at the University Pierre and Marie Curie (Paris, France). He specialized in the space sector with the 'Space-based Systems Engineering' master degree at the Observatory of Paris (Meudon, France). Throughout semesters abroad in Brescia (Italy), Toronto (Canada) and more recently at the French Space Agency (CNES Toulouse), he developed capability of meeting specifications and needs of a project and ability to work as part of a multidisciplinary team. He joined Exotrail first as a SATT Paris-Saclay Technology maturation engineer in 2017 and then in Exotrail team since July 2018.
Elena
Garombo
Mechanical
Engineer
Elena graduated from Politecnico di Torino in 2020 with a Master's degree in Aerospace Engineering, specializing in
Aerostructures. At the end of her Master's, Elena spent six months at GeorgiaTech, where she pursued her master thesis
focusing on flutter and structural optimization.
During her studies, she collaborated with the
Energy Center of Politecnico di Torino, and she was team leader of a team in charge of designing sailing boats.
At Exotrail, Elena does mechanical design and structural analysis.
Paul
Dewost
Space Mechanics
Enginee...
Paul graduated from École polytechnique (Palaiseau, France) in Mechanics. He enrolled
in a work-study contract between Exotrail and ISAE-Supaéro (Toulouse, France), a world
leader in aeronautics and aerospace engineering higher education, from which he will get
a MSc in Aerospace Engineering.
Paul developed his interest for the New Space industry when he worked as an AOCS intern
for Airbus Defence and Space. He notably designed and prototyped constraints avoidance
algorithms for a constellation of LEO telecommunication satellites. He is majoring in
Signals and Systems at ISAE-Supaero.
Manon
Carpentier
Thermal Mechanical Archite...
Manon graduated from SUPMECA. She realized his internship at SNECMA – Vernon about screw connections on Vulcain
and Vinci engines.
Then, she integrates Safran Aircraft Engines (at Villaroche) to work during more than 3 years ½ on
High Pressure Compressor on engines GE90 & GP like a mechanichal support engineer. She is a mechanical architect at Exotrail.
Julien
Hamon
AIT
Engineer
Julien is an AIT engineer with 3 years of experience in the space sector. He holds a master's degree in Space-based Engineering Systems from the Observatory of Paris and Paris-Sud University. His background in building acoustics and his various experiences at IAS (Institut d'Astrophysique Saptiale) and PIT (Plateforme d'Integrations et Tests) as a space test engineer gave him strong skills in test environment. He has worked on different Cubesats (PicSat, X-cubesat ...) and European mission instruments such as MicrOmega, Wisdom (Exomars 2020), Phebus (Bepi Colombo), PMCU Euclid, etc. He is used to work in clean rooms, and space test facilities such as thermal vacuum tanks, shakers and thermal chambers, with associated ECSS test specifications. He started working at Exotrail in mid-2016 first as a CNRS/UVSQ engineer, and then as an Exotrail engineer since August 2018. He acts as AIT engineer at Exotrail and is in charge of our test equipment and the AIT of our thrusters.
Andrea
Fiorentino
Space Mechanics
Enginee...
Andrea holds a MSc in Space Engineering from the University of Rome “Sapienza”, a French Engineering Diploma from ISAE-SUPAERO, a Master of Research in Automatics and Signal Treatment from the Ecole Normale Supérieure (Cachan), and a Master of Research in Neurotechnology where he worked in Reinforcement learning applications. He worked on Space debris as an intern at Airbus and then at CNES within the Space Mechanics department on behalf of Thales Services for 3 years. Andrea leads the orbital mechanics development at Exotrail.
Thibault
Hallouin
R&D
Engineer
Thibault is our R&D Engineer - Thibault is a recent graduate from IPSA (Paris, France) with a Master’s degree in Aerospace engineering, with a specialization in launchers and satellites. For its end-of-studies internship, he integrated the electric propulsion team within the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS). He has been involved in the development of new space systems. He then developed an optimized version of a low power Hall thruster and designed a first draft of a thrust balance for micro-thrusters. He is in charge of improving the performances of our cathodes and Hall thrusters at Exotrail.
Maxime
Montès
Electronics
Engineer
Maxime is a graduate of the CESI engineering school of Toulouse. Specialized in embedded electronic systems, he worked three years for Assystem developing dedicated nano-satellites test-benches and he discovered the Cubesat domain. Moreover, he spent three months within the F’SATI (French South African Institute of Technology) working on the ZACUBE-2, more specifically on the telecommunication part. Maxime is an electronic enthusiast and is Exotrail’s McGyver on top of being a confirmed Apple-addict. He joined Exotrail in October 2018 as Electronics Engineer.
Julien
Vaudolon
Propulsion
Engineer
Julien holds an Aerospace Master in Science Degree from ISAE-ENSMA and a PhD
in plasma propulsion (done jointly with CNES, CNRS and Snecma), focused on low-power Hall thruster
optimization. Julien is an aerospace enthusiast and a licensed pilot.
He previously worked
4 years at Safran as Hall thrusters design authority and was specifically responsible for the PPS®1350
and PPS®X00 Hall thruster developments. He leads today all Thruster Head modules developments at Exotrail.
👨🍳 Julien also holds a professional pastry diploma.
Pierre-Olivier
Mine
Tests
Architect
Pierre-Olivier has more than 10 years of experience in the space industry, building up experience in mechanical and thermal engineering. He worked 5 years in CNRS particularly on the BepiColombo ESA mission. He was the PHEBUS payload thermal architect. Then he joined Sodern (Ariane Group) for 2 years as a thermo-mechanical architect, working on optical payloads for ESA missions or defence. Finally, he spent almost 4 years in the UK in Airbus Defence and Space as a propulsion thermal architect for Telecom satellites. His role as our Test Architect in Exotrail is to optimise the thruster test (qualification & acceptance) philosophy in conjunction with the new space market. He is involved in the thermo-mechanical design of the thruster as well.
Mikaël
Fillastre
Lead
Software Engineer
Mikael is a software engineer with 12 years of experience, specialized in oriented object development, Agile methods, and DevOps tools. He worked in the space industry for Airbus Defence & Space and Thales Alenia Space. More than just developing new functionalities he was also involved in project management based on Agile methods. He also set up development environment & software architecture, ensuring code quality and robustness. He implemented a tool used to encode the telecommands to pilot the first electrical orbit raising satellite launched by Airbus Defence & Space. Mikael acts as Lead Software Engineer on ExoOPS™ products and oversees the global software architecture and good practices of Exotrail.
Antonio
Gurciullo
Plasma Physics
Research...
Antonio received his BSc degree in Aerospace Engineering from Politecnico di Torino in 2013 and his MSc degree in Electrophysics from KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden in 2015. He then had been pursuing a PhD degree in Electronic Engineering at University of Surrey within the Surrey Space Centre where he focused on technologies for enabling the use of alternative propellants in electric propulsion. He was also involved in projects supported by both institutional (ESA, UK Space Agency) and industrial (SSTL, Airbus DS) funding bodies while being a Research Assistant at the Surrey Space Centre in 2017. In 2018, he spent six months at Stanford University where he carried out an experimental investigation of a Hall Effect Thruster operated with molecular propellants. At Exotrail, Antonio oversees the development and characterisation of the plasma thrusters.
Laura
de Felice
Office
Manager
With over 5 years of experience in professional office executive assistant positions
and a track record of strong performance in high-volume, high-pressure environments,
Laura skillfully manages administrative duties and client relations at Exotrail.
As Office Manager, she ensures the smooth operation of the company with her robust
knowledge of administrative, legal management and efficient handling of purchases
and suppliers contracts. Laura also provides support to the team in fulfilling their
ongoing professional development & HR requests.
Benjamin
Auger
IT Architect & Software En...
After 4 years of experience in a major company, Orange Business Services as Project Manager,
Benjamin decided to join Exotrail team. He completed his education with a Master Degree in IT management,
he is passionate about disruptive technologies like SD WAN, virtualization, IaaS and digital culture in general.
He is a specialist on complex and hybrid IT architectures. He currently works on ExoOPS™ Operation software
as a software engineer. In addition to that, he manage the digital strategy in company by bringing his expertise
and agility in project management to the company.
Clément
Gimenez
Product
Owner
Clément graduated from ENSTA ParisTech in 2011 and worked 3 years taking care of the release of
a website for GEFCO as an IT consultant. He then moved to the hardware side of engineering at Kratzer Automation,
designing and commissioning test benches of all kind for the automotive industry majors. He was in 2019 Product
Owner of a line of climatic chambers for electric vehicles battery tests.
He joined the team in September 2019 with this mission : turn the ExoMG™ thruster first prototype into a clever
product line. Deeply inspired by Lego bricks, and -not more seriously- by versions management, systems engineering
and product design from his experiences on the ground, he's in charge of the ExoMG™ evolutions roadmap together
with its modular vision.
Louis
Petitjean
Automation
Engineer
As an automation engineer at Exotrail, Louis is in charge of the design, manufacturing and testing of measurement benches for the characterization of Hall thrusters. He works with the LabVIEW environment for task automation (Measurement of electrical quantities, vacuum tank control, control and thermal measurement of the environment, telemetry analysis, autonomous control of a hall effect thruster.).
Guillaume
Potel
AIT
Technician
I have a Technical degree in Physics Measurements (DUT Mesures Physiques) done in the University of Caen.
During the second year of my degree, I worked in the company MURATA specialized in ceramic condensators.
I worked in clean rooms to test and characterize different types of condensators. After these two years,
I did a one year bachelor degree in embedded systems in Aeronautic (LP ISEA) in Salon-de-Provence. During
this one year, I have done an internship at DASSAULT AVIATION, precisely at the flight test center in Istres.
I worked on the measurement installation of the French combat aircraft RAFALE. Then, after the end of my studies,
I worked for ASSYSTEM more than one year at AIRBUS DEFENCE AND SPACE in Toulouse, on different satellite programs
and participate at the AIT phases. I worked in clean facilities, and participate at different tests during integration
phases on satellites, such as vibration test, TVAC, EM compatibility tests. I have also participated at a launch
campaign for TIBA-1 in Kourou. I work at EXOTRAIL since November as AIT Technician and I am in charge of the assembly,
the integration and test of our thrusters.
Sébastien
Dumenil
VP Business Development
Sébastien has 20+ years of experience in International Sales, Marketing & Business Development. He started his
career on the Telecom & IT market holding various sales & marketing positions within companies such as Alcatel-Lucent
and Prosodie-Cap Gemini.
In 2009, he joined the space industry as Director Marketing & Sales within Arianespace and more recently he was
OHB France Director, an OHB SE subsidiary. Sebastien holds a Master’s Degree in Management from
Neoma Business School (Reims) and a Master’s Degree in Economics from Paris 12 University.
Federico
Torrini
Business
Development En...
Federico has 3 years of experience in the space sector. with a focus in electric propulsion.
He got his master’s degree in Plasma Physics from the University of Pisa. He then worked 3 years in Sitael covering different roles,
starting from R&D on thermionic hollow cathodes, passing then working as a system engineer on electric propulsion systems, and,
eventually, joining the business development team.
This heterogeneous background allowed Federico to earn a wide spectrum expertise on the electric propulsion world, from both
a technical and a commercial perspective. He is now part of the Exotrail Team working as Business Development Engineer.
Nicolas
Meyer
Mechanical
Engineer
Nicolas Meyer is Mechanical engineer. Specializing in milling machining, Nicolas is graduated
from Insitute of Technology from Mulhouse (France), in Mechanical and Productive Engineering and bachelor of
sciences in mechanical : manufacturing processes optimization.
He trained in the automotive sector within PSA Groupe as an apprentice Process technician and developed a new range
of milling tools. He finished his studies with a Master’s degree of industrial engineering and industrial production
at Strasbourg University (France). He worked in aeronautics sector at Safran Landing Systems as project manager during
his studies. Nicolas is passionate about manufacturing and all new industrial technologies. He participates in the
optimization of Exotrail products design.
Tom
Gelu
Software
Engineer
Tom does some black magic at Exotrail, and it works! He is a former 42 student and works on ExoOPS software development team.
Théo
Marischael
AIT
Technician
Theo graduated from University of Caen in Physics Measurements. He worked at the APAVE company during the
second year of its degree, where he assisted technicians during customer service. He also done a one year
bachelor degree in embedded systems in Aeronautic (LP EIAST).
He worked for 2 years at GANIL, a particle accelerator from CNRS and CEA. His missions was to install and
certify the magnetic measurement system for the new SPIRAL2 accelerator. After that, Theo worked for
SAFRAN, in the defense test pole. He was in charge of the certification of the different electronic systems
produced for the army.
Michele
Franci
Head of Business Developme...
