Expertise

CEO, The Ocean Agency

Richard is the founder and CEO of The Ocean Agency, a nonprofit supporting and accelerating ocean action through creative collaboration.

Before diving into ocean and coral reef conservation, he first worked at some of the top London advertising agencies and then as an artist and underwater photographer. It is this background that has guided his unique creative and business-thinking approach to ocean conservation. His imagery, revealing what is happening to our oceans, is some of the most viewed underwater imagery of all time, and his ideas, project and public speaking have made him a leading voice in the fight to save coral reefs.

His major successes include: 1) inventing the SVII camera and taking Google Street View underwater, 2) pioneering virtual reality ocean education – currently available to over 90 million kids, 3) the XL Catlin Seaview Survey – the most comprehensive underwater photographic survey and record of coral reefs with over 1 million images captured and analyzed, 4) revealing the crisis facing coral reefs in the Netflix Original Documentary, “Chasing Coral” – winner of the 2018 Emmy for Outstanding Nature Documentary, 5) 50 Reefs – a global scientific study to help target and inspire effective conservation support and action that resulted in $86 million in funding for leading science and conservation organizations, and 6) the Glowing campaign – a global campaign to accelerate coral reef conservation action and funding through popular influence and business involvement.