Visionary Leaders in Geospatial Technology, 2025 | Galilee Surveyors Ltd.
A Company Built on Precision
Founded in 1988 by his father, Galilee Surveyors has grown into one of Israel’s leading geospatial firms. Today, it is trusted with national-scale projects in energy, transportation, ports, and statutory mapping.
Firas grew up in the company, carrying survey equipment as a child before choosing the path of engineer and licensed surveyor. Over time, he worked his way into an executive role, now leading quality assurance and technology innovation on some of the country’s most complex infrastructure projects.
His mission is clear: deliver precision, innovation, and integrity in every project. As he puts it, “if the job is worth doing, we will do whatever it takes to get it done.”
Defining Moments in the Field
Firas’s career has been shaped by projects in extreme conditions. He once flew a drone near the border while the Iron Dome intercepted missiles overhead, mapped roads at the Dead Sea as sinkholes opened underfoot, and worked on a coastal oil jetty where a single misstep could have sent surveyors into the sea.
For more than a year, he and his teams also faced constant RTK signal spoofing and jamming. With GNSS corrections unreliable, they had to adapt methods, combine alternative tools, and rely on experience to keep projects moving.
These moments, Firas says, reinforced a core truth of his profession: “precision and adaptability are everything.”
Innovation Through Frustration and Bold Testing
“Innovation often starts with frustration,” Firas explains. “You’re on site, and you know there has to be a better way.”
The Carmel Tunnels project is one example. Relying only on total stations would have been slow and error-prone. By combining RTK GNSS outside with stationary laser scanning inside, Firas’s team achieved higher accuracy, greater safety, and faster results.
But for him, innovation is more than adopting tools — it’s an equation. Tools and skills feed each other. The more tools you master, the more your skills grow; the more skills you develop, the more value you can extract from new tools.
Many breakthroughs have come from bold, untraditional testing that others doubted at first — a piece of code, a new software, or an unconventional workflow. Some of those experiments went on to become standard practice after proving themselves in the field.
Journey in Surveying
Firas grew up surrounded by maps, drawings, and surveyors. In earlier days, professionals drafted maps by hand on paper and measured with chains. Today, entire environments are modeled from point clouds generated from drone imagery and laser scans.
What inspires him is not the equipment, but the ability to make sense of spatial data. “The real value of surveying is not in the tools, but in how you leverage data to solve complex problems and make decisions that matter,” he says.
His own journey — from student to engineer to licensed surveyor, and now executive — reflects the profession’s evolution.
Projects That Transformed His Career
One of the most transformative experiences of Firas’s career was overseeing national infrastructure projects that required mapping entire cities and coordinating multiple field teams. He developed a system linking survey data directly to contractor billing — creating accountability and saving significant public resources.
Marine and port projects also pushed him further. As the sole QA surveyor on site, he managed tasks ranging from crane rails requiring tolerances of just two millimeters, to bathymetric surveys where accuracy standards were closer to 10–15 centimeters. Switching between such extremes demanded versatility and discipline. “The essence of surveying is understanding context and delivering results infrastructure can rely on for decades,” he reflects.
Sustainability and Resilience
Many of Firas’s projects address natural hazards and resilience. During wildfires near Jerusalem, he was part of an emergency team using drones with scanners and cameras to model sections of forest. The simulations showed how the fire might spread and guided minimal tree trimming that prevented further damage.
Much of his work is also preventative. His teams have mapped corridors for electrified trains, identified underground cables, and supported the rollout of EV charging stations. These projects demonstrate how geospatial data enables smarter environmental decisions and supports sustainable infrastructure.
“Leadership is staying calm when the unexpected happens—and helping your team do the same.”
Leadership and Ethics
Firas believes leadership is about responsibility. “I lead as if my name is on every result,” he says. Growing up in a family business taught him that every project carries their reputation.
For him, integrity means accuracy, reliability, and impartiality. The responsibility of a surveyor is to provide clarity and safety for civil society, regardless of the environment.
He also sees communication as central to leadership. “Half the problems in a project are solved by talking clearly to people. The rest come from the unexpected,” he explains. In surveying, surprises are constant — remote sites, high stakes, or shifting conditions. Leadership means adapting quickly, staying calm, and helping your team do the same.
Looking Ahead
Firas envisions nation-scale digital twins becoming reality, supported by AI and real-time sensors. Projects in energy, transportation, ports, and statutory mapping are already laying the foundation.
The next milestones he sees include:
– Nation-scale digital twins integrated into governance
– Hybrid workflows combining drones, GNSS, SLAM, and laser scanning
– AI-driven real-time infrastructure monitoring
– Surveyors recognized as strategic leaders of resilience
Inspiration and Advice
Firas’s greatest inspiration is his father, who founded the company and showed him that hard work pays off. “I still can’t beat him to the office in the morning,” he laughs.
He also finds motivation in projects others hesitate to touch — tunnels deep underground, ports on unstable seas, deserts where the heat pushes people to the limit. These challenges remind him that surveying is not just about points and lines, but about protecting people, building trust, and shaping the future.
His advice to the next generation: “Don’t be blinded by shiny tools. Build your toolbox, but more importantly, build the mindset to study problems and design the right solution for each one. Half the challenges you’ll face can be solved through communication. The rest demand resilience and adaptability.”
