Ira Scharf

Ira Scharf is Chief Executive Officer of PlanetiQ. Ira joined PlanetiQ in early 2023 and brings over 30 years of senior operating experience in enterprise weather solutions, artificial intelligence, cyber security and enterprise SaaS solutions. Most recently he was CEO and Founder of Spark Insights, an AI and geospatial analytics insurtech company founded in 2018 to deliver unparalleled global satellite and aerial-based insights to insurers and reinsurers for risk analysis, pricing and post-catastrophe damage assessment and response. Spark Insights was acquired by Concirrus Ltd in 2021.

Prior to that, Ira held numerous senior executive positions at major enterprise weather and cyber security firms, including Chief Operating Officer of Tomorrow.io, Chief Strategy Officer of BitSight Technologies and President, Commercial Services at AirDat (acquired by Panasonic).

Earlier in his career Ira spent eight years as Vice President and Division General Manager at The Weather Company (acquired by IBM) where he led the development of enterprise weather solutions for airlines, corporate and general aviation, energy utilities, wind and solar energy producers, agricultural entities, traders and hedge funds. He has been quoted in numerous business publications including BusinessWeek and The Economist.

Ira earned a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from MIT, a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.