I connect commercial priorities, product decisions and specialist delivery. Over 15+ years, I have built digital businesses and led long-term client partnerships from proposition and launch through growth.
Company-reported growth published in 2021, during the partnership.
I was central to ClickASnap from the initial discussions and the pivot from video to image sharing through product planning, technical delivery and ongoing iteration.
SKYLAB£713kTURNOVER · £346k PRE-TAX PROFIT · 81% GROSS MARGINFinal 18-month reporting period.
I built and ran SKYLAB, taking responsibility for commercial strategy, pricing, clients, resourcing, delivery and margin.
Digital SHIFT & SKYLAB12+PERSON CORE TEAM · 13 ROOM INNOVATION CENTREI built a core team and wider specialist network, bringing people, clients and ventures together through the agency and Centre for Innovation.
Products · Businesses · Teams
Years of involvement: –Embedded product leadership & international growth
I helped turn an expensive video-platform prototype into a sustainable photography product, using real usage and unit economics to guide the pivot, then continued leading product direction as ClickASnap grew internationally.
Years of involvement: –Software, ventures & commercial leadership
I built SKYLAB into a profitable software business and a platform for ambitious digital ventures, then developed a 13-room Centre for Innovation around it, bringing teams, specialists, studios and early-stage businesses together.
Years of involvement: –Agency, team & commercial leadership
I founded Digital SHIFT by combining the talent, clients and resources of three agencies, then acquiring a fourth. The model paired a strong permanent team with a trusted specialist network that could scale around each project.
Years of involvement: –Product strategy, UX & connected operations
I turned an initial app requirement into an integrated platform connecting orders, production, quality assurance, management and client reporting. The system helped Custom Marine demonstrate the operational maturity required to support its Sunseeker relationship.
Years of involvement: –Turning an early-stage idea into an investable product
I helped Hollabox’s founders turn an idea and Photoshop concepts into a product roadmap, user journeys and a working first version, while strengthening the proposition that helped secure an initial £100,000 investment.
Years of involvement: –Applied AI & knowledge systems
I designed and built LifeOS, a local-first personal intelligence system that connects email, documents, messages, tasks and knowledge while retaining source evidence and requiring confirmation before records are changed.
Years of involvement: –Commercial product launch
I helped turn a free community project into a commercial Unreal Engine product, shaping the positioning, brand, launch and route to market for its first paid release.
Years of involvement: National brand digital campaign
For Clipper Tea’s £1m national campaign, I led the digital delivery, translated the creative platform into campaign experiences and coordinated the specialist work needed to support a nationally recognised consumer brand.
Years of involvement: –Embedded digital, product & growth partnership
Across a near decade-long embedded partnership, I led Blue Pelican’s rebrand and built its owned recruitment ecosystem, connecting commercial direction, digital products and growth activity in a platform the business could control.
Years of involvement: –Product R&D & real-time 3D
Over six years I have led the product and hands-on Unreal Engine R&D, combining systems design, world-building, prototyping and specialist collaboration around an independently developed game vision.
Built businesses and capability
I founded Digital SHIFT by pooling the talent, clients and resources of three local agencies and acquiring a successful fourth agency for its brand, client base, experience and offices. I built a team of 12+ full-time people, supported by coworking specialists and long-term industry partners. That combined capability opened larger client opportunities and overflow work for national agencies. I led the commercial expansion that enabled a parallel business, SKYLAB, and a 13-room Centre for Innovation housing both businesses.
I built SKYLAB as a specialist software and venture business, alongside the 13-room Centre for Innovation in a Grade II-listed Bournemouth building. I led its conversion and connected technical and creative specialists, clients and early-stage ventures. I helped local start-ups secure initial funding through commercial guidance, investor introductions and media facilities. Following a highly profitable final trading period, I concluded SKYLAB through a planned, solvent wind-up ahead of relocating to France.
After concluding SKYLAB and relocating to France in early 2024, I continued building independently across product development, applied R&D and emerging technology.
That work has included LifeOS, a local-first personal intelligence and knowledge system, alongside ongoing development in Unreal Engine and interactive systems. These projects have allowed me to keep working hands-on with product design, UX, technical architecture, prototyping, automation and AI-assisted workflows while continuing to develop ideas that began alongside earlier agency and client work.
The common thread throughout my career has been translating commercial ambition into something tangible. I have founded and grown businesses, worked as an embedded partner inside client organisations, shaped products from early concepts, coordinated specialist technical teams and stepped into the detail when a problem needed to be understood rather than simply delegated.
I now want to bring that combination of commercial, product and technical leadership into a senior role where I can build or lead a distributed team, set product direction, make commercial decisions and remain accountable for the results.
Marc Thornton
Technical toolkit
Best-fit opportunities
Opportunities where commercial direction, product decisions and specialist delivery come together.
For organisations that need commercial priorities, customer journeys and technical delivery brought together around the next stage of a product's development.
For organisations that need clear goals, practical plans and the right conditions for specialists to work together across disciplines.
For complex products or fragmented operations that need clearer relationships between people, information, decisions and delivery.
For opportunities to use AI within a useful workflow, with attention to the underlying information, implementation and review rather than technology for its own sake.
Open to opportunities
I am open to permanent, interim and contract leadership where I can lead or build a distributed team and take responsibility for product direction, commercial decisions and results.
Based in France, working remotely with international travel across the UK, Europe and North America.
