ir. PHI (Paul) Goethals, MSc

General profile
As a Business Development Manager responsible for developing new R&D projects for Agribusiness and Food-industry. Key-words: Equipment Manufacturers, ICT-companies, Computer Vision & Robotics applications, Information management, Big-data applications (pattern recognition, deep learning, artifical intelligence, neural networks, ontologies, ...).
Example application areas:
- Automated product quality inspection using computer vision
- Robotics in agro-food production, food processing and logistics
- Information exchange in Agri-food chains

My passion and focus:
Business Development related to Information management and technology in agribusiness, food and life science. To improve and market products and services in pursuit of the food- and sustainability challenges of the 21st century. Preferably acting as the ‘pivoting point’ between customers, R&D, production, sales & marketing, I acquired a broad experience in:
• Information management / technology in international agribusiness, food and life science
• Business consultancy
• Product management
• Project- and team management
• Business development, sales- / account management.

My personal profile:
• Market scout, initiator, organizer
• Broad interest in both business and content
• Networker, ‘spider in the web’ with external focus
• Enthusiastic, inspired by technology and innovations
• Creative / realistic look on business opportunities
• Group worker, motivator with drive for quality results
• Open minded, humorous, witty.

My vision and profound conviction:
A world population of 9 billion people in 2050 heavily impacts world food production and -supply. Increasing consumer demand and rising public awareness challenges animal and plant production directly. It also disrupts adjacent businesses in genetics, feed, food processing, logistics, trade and regulations.
The only viable option to cope with these challenges is a more intensive though sustainable agro-food production chain. Striving for an ever higher efficiency under tightening preconditions of:
• Animal health and –welfare
• Public health, environment
• Societal acceptance.

The inevitable requirements:
• Applying the latest scientific knowledge and ‘state of the art’ (information) technology
• Speeding up R&D towards swift market introduction of more intelligent ‘precision’ applications
• Creating more awareness for the benefits of ‘fact based’, ‘data driven’ food production.