James Lawson has been a business journalist, editor, publisher and copywriter for 28 years. He launched New Perspectives magazine for Pearson Professional in 1996, the first UK magazine to focus on marketing technology, analysis and data. In 1998, he founded Database Marketing magazine and published it for ten years before selling up and going freelance in 2008. Since then, he has written for numerous clients both in print and online, and across publishing, marketing, PR and beyond. Based in Manchester, he also covers renewable energy, IT, data, 3D printing, defence and many other technical subjects. In a previous life, he worked as an offshore engineer in the oil industry.