Mark Leonard Bio

Leonard also served as chairman of the board for Enventure Inc., a joint-venture company with Shell and Halliburton, and as the director of Shell Technology Ventures Inc., which was created to monetize other Shell technologies as appropriate. In 2002, he became director of Shell Deepwater Services and, from 2009 to 2023, he was a director of TGS-NOPEC, a multibillion-dollar Norwegian seismic company that specializes in acquiring and processing data for all types of energy exploration in various areas of the world.

Leonard was a member of the Indiana University Geological Sciences Advisory Board from 2001 to 2011, has been a member of the Indiana University College of Arts and Sciences Executive Dean’s Advisory Board since 2010, and recently became a founding member of the IU Astronomy Advisory Board. He’s also a director of the Reynolds Field Station in New Mexico and served as the executive director of the Indiana University Geologic Field station near Bozeman, Mont., from 2011 to 2012.

Leonard has been married to his wife, Kim, since 1991 and has two children: Steven (30) and Kelli (23). He and Kim reside on Lake Conroe in Montgomery, Texas. Mark’s passions include astronomy, golf, basketball, boating, fishing, camping, and traveling the U.S. and world with his family. He loves to share his passion for astronomy and geology with students—and anyone else who will listen—and has “planted” telescopes in Indiana, Montana, Texas, Michigan, New Mexico, Brazil, and Kenya. He created an observatory at the YMCA’s Camp Cullen in Trinity, Texas, and can be found there on clear nights leading the astronomy outreach program.