Karolina Sarna

Atmospheric physicist. Organisational diagnostician. Builder.

I'm a physicist who got impatient with academia and went to build things. A decade in space and climate tech taught me that the hard part is never the science. It's the organisation around the science. I now diagnose what's structurally broken in climate tech companies and redesign the system so the same people produce different outcomes.

Rebel Strategy Lab
Founder 2024 — present
Helsinki / Stockholm

Structural diagnosis for climate tech and space organisations. I work with investors (VCs, family offices, impact funds) and founders at two levels.

Science and technology evaluation. I stress-test the thesis behind climate tech and space deals. Not "is the technology impressive" but where the science can actually be applied, whether the target industry can absorb it, and what would need to be true for the commercial case to hold.

Operational diagnosis. When an organisation is underperforming and nobody can name why, I go in. I sit with the founder, map the structure, identify where the system is generating the failure, and redesign it.

Sectors: earth observation, climate adaptation, energy markets, carbon capture, defence and dual-use, sustainable agriculture, GHG monitoring.

Gallant Finland
Board Member 2025 — present

Strategy, investment evaluation, and guiding European expansion.

I kept zooming out. From the instrument, to the data, to the product, to the team, to the organisation, to the structural patterns across organisations.
ICEYE
May 2021 — Feb 2025 · 3 years 10 months · Helsinki
Director of Product Oct 2023 — Feb 2025

Owned the climate adaptation product line. Took flood monitoring and natural catastrophe products to €20M ARR serving governments and insurers. Led a cross-functional team of 50+ across product, data science, and engineering.

Director of Applications Engineering Oct 2022 — Oct 2023

Grew the software engineering team 10x in 12 months. Built the technical roadmap that enabled data delivery across multiple industry verticals.

Head of Data Infrastructure and Tooling Jan 2022 — Sep 2022

Built the data foundation: curation, infrastructure, governance. Tripled throughput capacity and aligned data initiatives with commercial expansion.

Data Strategy and Acquisition Lead May 2021 — Jan 2022

Built the data strategy and acquisition programmes from scratch. Consolidated overlapping services and established governance practices across operations.

Yousician
Head of Data & Insights Feb 2025 — Jul 2025
Helsinki

Data strategy and organisational insights for a consumer tech scaleup. Led data analytics, data science, and data engineering.

ESA / ESTEC
Space Systems Performance Engineer May 2018 — Apr 2021
The Hague, Netherlands

Satellite mission engineering for the ALTIUS ozone monitoring mission. Designed scientific data products, managed technical specifications across space and ground segments, and built end-to-end performance models.

Akvo
Data Science Manager Aug 2016 — Apr 2018
Amsterdam, Netherlands

Built data services and products for international development organisations and governments. Established a data science consultancy service and doubled data product revenue.

Research
2011 — 2016 · Netherlands
PhD Researcher, Atmospheric Physics 2012 — 2016
TU Delft

Cloud microphysics, aerosol-cloud interactions, remote sensing instrumentation. 10 publications, 56 citations.

Researcher, Remote Sensing 2013 — 2016
KNMI (Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute)

Developed lidar inversion algorithms for cloud optical extinction retrieval.

Data Analyst 2011
Megajoule

Wind data processing, turbine layout optimisation, and energy production estimation for wind farm development.

PhD, Atmospheric Physics and Dynamics
Technische Universiteit Delft
2012 — 2021
MSc, Environmental Protection
Warsaw University of Technology
2008 — 2010
MSc, Environmental Science
Universidad de Salamanca
2008 — 2009
Erasmus exchange
Engineering
KU Leuven
2010
BSc, Environmental Protection
Warsaw University of Technology
2004 — 2008

Languages: English (native-level), Polish (native), Spanish (professional), Dutch (professional)

Building: Codesea (code visualisation for visual thinkers), Hippocampus (open-source MCP memory server), Binthere (trash map)

Writing: Articles on climate policy, earth observation market structure, and organisational failure. Book in progress on how environment shapes identity.

Podcast: Co-host, The Rebolutionary Journey (with PJ)

10 publications in atmospheric physics and remote sensing. 56 citations. Full list on ResearchGate.