GEOINT 2025 | Semaphore Maritime Solutions - Bill Conroy

Bill Conroy discusses his diverse background, which includes serving in the Coast Guard on an Arctic icebreaker, studying GIS, and working for NGA on nautical charts. He introduces his company, Semaphore Maritime Solutions, which he started about a year ago. Conroy explains his primary work involves providing maritime analysis for the US Space Force TAC SRT program, handling unclassified data requests. Drawing on his extensive maritime experience and licenses, he analyzes data like AIS, contextualizing it with factors like weather and regulations to identify suspicious activities. He focuses on taking existing data sets and providing deeper insights through activities-based analysis. Conroy notes that his location in landlocked St. Louis is not a barrier to this work. He mentions utilizing NGA's Port Index data set in his platform. He highlights networking at events like GEOINT as part of his growth strategy and positions himself as a maritime subject matter expert valuable for contextualizing various geospatial data streams.

Highlights

• Bill Conroy shares his background in the Coast Guard, GIS, and NGA nautical charts.

• He founded Semaphore Maritime Solutions, providing maritime analysis.

• He primarily supports the US Space Force TAC SRT program with unclassified maritime data requests.

• His maritime expertise helps analyze data like AIS in context.

• He provides activities-based analysis to identify suspicious maritime activity.

• Location is becoming less important for this work; St. Louis hosts an NGA office.

• He uses NGA's Port Index data set.

• Growing the business involves networking at events like GEOINT.

• He offers expertise as a maritime subject matter expert to contextualize data.