The platform behind the world’s most advanced land registries.
LAVA is a proven, configurable registry platform, not a multi-year custom build. Modernize with the team that has been delivering national registry systems for more than twenty years.
We know the destination.
We know the journey.
Most modernizations are sold as multi-year custom builds: scope grows, teams rotate, budgets balloon, and the system arrives late, or never. LAVA removes the biggest risk in the project: it already exists. Proven in production, configured rather than rebuilt for your jurisdiction’s laws, and delivered by a team that does land registries and nothing else. Business Solution Engineering, our method built from more than twenty years of registry deliveries, is how we take a live registry from where it is to where it needs to be.
Who we serve
There is no standard registry, and no single modernization approach
The same platform, from a 1,200-title Indigenous land registry to national systems serving millions. Registry integrity doesn’t scale down, even when jurisdictions do. Six legal frameworks, one system, at every stage of the modernization journey.
Our platform
The LAVA platform
LAVA’s rules engine adjudicates routine dealings automatically: lawfully, consistently, and at scale, freeing your examiners for the cases that need them.
Land titles, deeds, ground rents, indigenous rights: multiple registries and legal frameworks operating in a single platform.
New capability is configuration, not a new contract, a new vendor, or a new build.
our record
The numbers behind the work
The company is eight years old. The team behind it has been modernizing the world’s registries for more than twenty.
20+ years
The team's record of registry delivery, from provincial systems to national platforms.
6 legal frameworks
Torrens, deeds, customary and more, running in a single platform.
3 offices, 4 regions
Vancouver, Belfast, Dublin, with programs across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America and the Caribbean.
Our Team
Software is only half the challenge
The people behind LAC built the systems running some of the world’s most advanced registries, and ran the registries themselves. We know where the assumptions break, because we’ve been on both sides of the desk.
Darin Nielsen
Chief Executive Officer
Darin brings three decades of leading large-scale technology transformation programs and global initiatives across IT, land administration, and financial services. As a Director at Microsoft, he led the team that developed Microsoft’s enterprise sales model for its global sales organization and partners, and directed the information architecture behind Microsoft’s global sales, marketing, and services operations. At MDA, he was Vice President of the land administration line of business, owning its P&L and leading the organization that engineered and delivered government land registry, cadastre, and complex information systems, including British Columbia’s land title transformation and the pursuit of New Zealand’s next-generation registry.
Dean Nielsen
President
Dean leads LAC’s corporate strategy, finance, commercial structuring, and international expansion. As Vice President of Business Development for MDA’s land administration business, he led global market strategy, established the framework for the line’s as-a-Service business model, and served as commercial lead on large international registry procurements, including the pursuit of New Zealand’s next-generation registry. Earlier, as Vice President of the Niho Development Group, he led technology R&D and new product development at Landcor Data Corporation, the British Columbia real estate data, analytics, and automated-valuation firm.
Craig Johnston
Chief Operating Officer
Craig spent a decade as Director of Land Titles for British Columbia, a vice-president appointment reporting to the CEO of the Land Title and Survey Authority. He was the statutory decision-maker for land title practice in the province and led a division of up to 120 staff. He took the land title office from paper-dominant to more than 90% electronic filing, made e-filing mandatory from 2011 and in 2012 introduced automated examination and registration, the first in Canada, processing about half of all applications by the time he left. The systems behind that modernization were built by engineers who went on to found LAC. He joined LAC in 2021.
Steve Smith
Chief Technology Officer
Steve spent 22 years at MDA building land and property information systems, rising from systems engineer to divisional CTO. He was Program Director for the LTSA Business Transformation Initiative, the three-year build of British Columbia’s next-generation land title system, including its rules-based automated decision-making. He subsequently led the delivery of ParcelMap BC, the award-winning digital parcel fabric for British Columbia. Steve led the technical solution for the pursuit of New Zealand’s next-generation registry, which resulted in a sole-source selection. Steve is the chief architect of the LAVA platform.
Mark Ellingson
Chief Financial Officer
Mark is a CPA whose background spans Deloitte Private, high-growth technology environments, and entrepreneurial ventures. He has founded and operated his own companies and brings hands-on CFO experience across financial due diligence, valuations, and board reporting. Most recently, he served as the CFO of AI Partnerships, overseeing finance in a rapidly scaling, innovation-focused organization. At LAC, Mark leads the finance function across the company’s multi-jurisdictional structure (Canada, the UK, and Ireland), including international tax, subsidiary financial operations, and investor reporting.
Jeremy McCrea
Director of Business Development
Jeremy leads LAC’s global business development and serves on the board of LAC Ireland, the company’s Dublin subsidiary. A designated Canadian Residential Appraiser (AIC) with more than a decade in mortgage lending and financial services, he has spent his career on the market side of land: valuing it, financing it, and advising the people who own it. At LAC, he brings that grounding to partnerships with the governments who keep land ownership secure.
LAC + AI
Practical AI for land registry
We use AI responsibly, where it genuinely fits: inside our solutions, across your transition, and in daily operations, helping your team work smarter and faster with fewer errors.
work at lac
Complex problems, global scale, measurable impact
We’re growing across three countries and building the platforms, and now the AI systems, behind the world’s land registries. If you want frontier engineering with civic stakes, this is it.
Talk to us about your registry.
Whether you’re planning a modernization or comparing approaches, we’ll show you what LAVA would look like in your jurisdiction.
Contact Us