Tech Talks with Elmer Brinkmann & Dominik Kotulski, Sensorfact

Welcome to ‘Tech Talks’ with Ana Andrade, a Q&A focused on how Tech is making the Built Environment SMARTER.

This bulletin series features key industry players from the land technology and built environment space in conversation with consultant Ana Andrade, drawing insights around the topics of  AI, IoT, GDPR and ESG compliance, and much more!

This week we have been in touch with Elmer Brinkmann and Dominik Kotulski from Sensorfact.

Sensorfact’s mission is to reduce waste in industrial companies. They do this by providing smart monitoring solutions for the industry. All their systems are fully plug & play, and consist of hardware (wireless sensors), software (a clear online platform) and advice (algorithms to detect saving opportunities). This way, they help customers across 20+ countries to improve their bottom-line with >10%.

What does your role entail at Sensorfact?  

Elmer: I’m the Team lead for the Sales Development team for the Benelux. My main  responsibility is making sure enough new business opportunities come in. I’m hiring, training and coaching the Sales Development Representatives and make sure they book lots of quality demos.  

Dominik: I have been working at Sensorfact as a corporate recruiter for over a year and a half now. I mainly focus on sales roles such as Account Executive and Sales Development Representative for several European markets.

How did you find yourself working in the sector you’re currently working in? What unique opportunities and challenges have you faced so far? 

Elmer: Coming from the world of recruitment marketing with a certain proposition, the proposition Sensorfact has for it’s future clients is amazing. It’s really versatile and complete. Working together with now 1600+ clients, I see we can help the industry big time with lowering their carbon footprint. So it’s really nice to be able to help and create such a big positive impact, we literally saving tens of thousands of euros for companies and thereby massively reduce their energy consumption. Challenges we’ve faced so far are growing really quickly, so we need to keep monitoring everything we do to stay scalable. Fortunately, so far we’ve managed to do so. 

Dominik: When I was looking for a company in which I wanted to continue my professional career, my goal was to join a company thanks to which my work would have a positive impact on the planet and the world around us. Sensorfact was the obvious and only choice. 

Working in such a modern and rapidly developing company is a pleasure, every day is super exciting.

From a recruiter’s perspective, it makes my job easier because more and more people are looking for places like Sensorfact and it is much easier to encourage the best talents on the market to join our organization. 

It goes without saying that the use of AI has been an increasingly relevant topic. What are your thoughts on that? Are you currently adopting (or planning to) this type of technology at Sensorfact? 

Elmer: AI and the possibilities it brings are amazing, you can do some really cool things with it!! We’re absolutely looking into the possibilities of integrating it within Sensorfact. We’re a company that keeps innovating, and integrating AI is certainly part of that.  

How do you think tech and data collection might interfere with GDPR in your business? How do you plan to tackle this issue?  

Elmer: It doesn’t. We’re making sure all data is only accessible for the right people. It’s really important to us to handle this topic in the right way, so it’s something we keep monitoring.
 

Could you tell us more about the hardware component of your services (if applicable)? What changes have you seen in IoT over the years?  

Elmer: We started with non-invasive click sensors that go around the power cables of the individual machines to be able to measure at machine level. These sensors are working the way they are supposed to, so we still use them. Besides that, we’ve expanded to monitoring compressed air, water, gas and predictive maintenance, and are seeing huge savings in those areas too! The software we use, continuously updates for improvements and thereby expands the possibilities of savings. The same goes for the by-us-developed algorithms, this is where we really make the difference. These algorithms help our Energy Consultant team interpret the gathered data in the best way possible and with that provide our customers with the best possible savings advice. It’s really nice!
 

How do you see the industry evolving in the next few years, and what impact might it have on professionals (thinking of AI, automation, data protection, privacy, IoT)? 

Elmer: Energy saving is a huge topic for the Benelux and will be for the rest of Europe and the rest of the world too. We’ve started our business in the Benelux but see the need rising in other areas too, so this is where we focus on besides our business in the Benelux. Looking at the impact we’ve created in the Benelux (where lowering the carbon footprint was a focus for the industry already) so far, I’m sure we can be even more impactful for areas  where lowering energy consumption isn’t that high on the agenda yet, because it will be. Obviously, we keep evolving and improving our services and grab every opportunity to do so.
 

Finally, what advice would you give to aspiring players and entrepreneurs looking to enter this space? 

Elmer: Try to keep up 😉 

Dominik: Be proactive, don’t stop learning new things because everything changes quite quickly. Even if you have a certain level of knowledge in a given topic, I am sure that new and more efficient concepts are just around the corner and we all need to adapt to them quickly because the market and competition demand it.