Foodmate | InsideTrack Jan 2018 - IPPE | Page 12

MEET THE ULTIMATE TEAM The IPPE 2018 is an official platform to showcase Foodmate’s latest developments, and this year, we are launching the ULTIMATE Whole Leg Deboning System. The ULTIMATE is a revolutionary machine, utilizing X-ray technology as it has never been used before in the industry. We invite you to meet the people be- hind this masterpiece equipment. Although there is an entire team involved in developing new equipment, Dirk Stooker and Juul van den Berg are ULTIMATE’s leading drivers, in charge of bringing the idea from conception to a highly successful production-ready product. THE BRAINS BEHIND OUR INTELLIGENT WHOLE LEG DEBONER, THE ULTIMATE, GIVE US AN INSIGHT ON R&D AND INDUSTRY TRENDS MEET DIRK STOOKER Dirk is one of those guys that wakes-up in the morning and tells himself while he is preparing for the day “Yes…I’ve got an idea and I know how it needs to look.” After he ar- rives at work (the Foodmate R&D department), he starts doing his thing, getting excited about gathering materials together and to start testing his ideas. By the end of the day, he is on a notepad designing and demonstrating his ideas to the management team....And so, a new development is born. Of course, it does not always work like this and it’s obviously a much-abbreviated description of the process, be- cause it is not as simple as it sounds. But the main point is that at Foodmate, there is room to explore your creativity. In fact, we encourage it! Dirk has been in R&D for over 25 years, and with Foodmate for the last nine years. A combination of acquired learning, crea- tivity, and daily hands-on concept development and testing, gives Dirk a sense of knowledge and expertise that only a few people in the industry have today. Dirk has been the father of some of the big success stories at Foodmate, such as the OPTI Dark Meat Deboning Systems. Always with full passion and dedication, Dirk never shies away from a new challenge and always takes care of his “child” through all stages along the de- velopment process and remains involved until the first series of machines are rolling out to the first customers. Dirk has one another big passion, and that is soccer. In his young days, Dirk was a talented player and even played in the Dutch first division. After a few years as-as a soccer player, Dirk got involved as a trainer and coach for some local soccer teams. And to this day, he dedicates time to strategic functions for his local soccer team. MEET JUUL VAN DEN BERG Juul started his engineering career at Foodmate in 2010, soon after graduating from the HTS (High Technical Col- lege). From the beginning, Juul showed he had a keen eye for new technology. Shortly after joining the Food- mate team, Juul was transferred to the R&D department, in a position where he could be creative and work on new technology from an engineering point of view. One of the first developments Juul worked on was the WTS Weigh- ing Transfer Machine and shortly after, on the all-new buffer transfer system. Juul has a curious mind and thinks out of the box in a way that not many people can. Once the idea of the ULTIMATE Whole Leg Deboner was born, we already knew that a critical element of this new development should be the ability to measure each leg individually. Juul and the team decided that the X-ray technology would make a significant difference in mechanical solutions and set an entirely new standard in whole leg deboning. Q&A | Given his background, Juul was responsible for the engineering part of the ULTIMATE, from a prototype to a production ready ma- chine. And together with a team of dedicated engineers and in close collaboration with Dirk, a real masterpiece of intelligence got developed. WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THE DIRECTION OF POULTRY AUTOMATION IN THE NEXT 10 YEARS? DIRK: The challenge…. There is so much more to be designed and developed in this industry. We are standing at the verge of advanced automation of poultry equipment. When this happens the indus- try will be more attractive to vastly larger group of qualified personnel, who will have many opportuni- ties to develop. 12 Juul is a young and creative engineer who can think outside of the box. Besides being behind his desk and in his computer drafting a new development, Juul enjoys just as much being on the floor and working on the equipment. Juul also travels with first prototypes that are tested in the field, to troubleshoot initial concepts and to optimize the system. Juul is the father of two small kids, has a broad interest in technology trends, and loves working on projects around the house. WE SAT WITH DIRK AND JUUL FOR A SHORT TALK AND A GOOD CUP OF COFFEE... WHAT MAKES THE POULTRY INDUSTRY SO ATTRACTIVE TO WORK IN? PAGE Juul then took it from there and started researching X-ray technol- ogy and ways in which we could integrate this technology into a machine. Then the next step was gathering the data from the X-ray image and develop a software system that would process and sort the data. JUUL: As an engineer, I am very interested in the technical aspect of poultry processing equipment. Within the Poultry Industry, the technical require- ments are very diverse, which makes it very appeal- ing to me. The industry dictates a “clean” design and construction, which means I get more opportunity to think about the physical design and the technical design of the machine and make it extra beautiful. DIRK: In the future we will follow the automotive industry uti