Mark Johnston

COO

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Mark Johnston

Mark leads Operations for RGDL. He brings a wealth of experience into that role from his time leading complex global research, development, strategy and operational functions in FTSE 100 companies, high growth start-ups, and non-for-profit organisations.

Mark previously held the role of COO at Cambridge Assessment, an Educational Services department of the University of Cambridge, where he was Chairman of the Board and Executive Director for a machine learning and computational linguistics-based startup (ELiT) and on the board of a machine learning research institute and several international businesses.

Mark has launched several globally successful digital products and established multiple new digital businesses. He has deployed and operated mission critical high performance e-infrastructure services, across Europe, to serve the European Commission and address the digital divide. He has led teams to undertake technological research to ensure Europe continues to be at the forefront of networking and research collaboration on a global scale. He was instrumental in developing the beginnings of Europe’s software defined research network and championed Europe’s networking research community to engage and contribute to the open networking foundation. Mark helped launch and grow two European Telecommunication start-ups, at the start of telecommunication deregulation in Europe, helping one to be valued at $850M and the other raise $400M in capital to build a pan-European fibre network.

Mark is a graduate of the University of Edinburgh Business School.