'There are always opportunities somewhere'

The industry cleans pipes preventively, on good luck, says Fabian Compagner. His company ToPerform therefore developed a sensor that measures and predicts pollution. An innovation with global potential. IBDO helped him navigate the complexities of international business.

Last December, Fabian Compagner stood on a stage in the American city of Houston. In the audience were delegates from multinationals from, among others, the chemical, energy and process industries. Fabian, CEO and founder of ToPerform, got to tell his extraordinary story at the annual Pumps & Pipes event. Not bad for someone for whom entrepreneurship was not in his plans a few years earlier.

Fabian worked for years in the chemical and food industry, in various management and executive positions. Everywhere he saw the same pattern: pipes get dirty, but nobody knows when. So one cleans preventively, at random. But what is the right time? Too early means unnecessary downtime. Too late often costs even more money.

'We worked mainly on the symptom of pollution,' he says. 'It's like taking an aspirin. We have pollution, so we clean. Doesn't it work? Then we clean again. Or we think: it will probably be necessary, so we take an aspirin. So you always respond afterwards. And nobody seemed willing or able to change anything. Out of that frustration, ToPerform was eventually born. A company that is now attracting the attention of major international players from the chemical and food industries, among others.

But how did he want to address the cause in concrete terms? For that, Fabian, with a background in chemical technology and computer science, had a clear idea: predict pollution with data and AI. That way you know exactly when and where it will accumulate, instead of guessing.

In working out the plan, however, it quickly became apparent that much factory data was not usable for data science. So an independent source was needed. A short time later, in June 2021, through a project at the Institute Sustainable Processing Technology, Fabian came into contact with an American chemical company, with a Dutch branch in Rotterdam.

It became a paid pilot. The chemical concern acted as a test environment for the smart sensor, with pipes with real process pressure and contamination. That way, the company could help ToPerform scale up from lab level to factory scale. Fabian: "Apparently the problem was big enough for them to give us a chance as a launching customer.

Fabian went full steam ahead as always, until in October 2022 his aorta suddenly ruptured. In retrospect, it turned out to be a tipping point in a positive sense. He learned to dose better and has since become, in his own words, calmer and more thoughtful. 'It may sound crazy, but I'm glad it happened to me,' he says. 'I begrudge it to someone else, too. At least, if you come out of it as well as I did. It was the signal for me: I have to build an organization. Because one man is very vulnerable. It's like that critical leadership in a factory. If that one is clogged, then everything stops.'

As ToPerform grew from one person with an intern to a team of six people, the first international inquiries also came. It started when an American branch of a company from Zeeland contacted us. In the Netherlands we don't have enough resources to invest, they told us, but here we do. Whether ToPerform might want to test in America. It sounded attractive, but Fabian hesitated. 'I can drive to Terneuzen in no time and besides, I know Dutch legislation. But America, that is of a different order, I knew from my own experience. Because what liability risks do you run? And how do you arrange all that'

But to close the door right now, no, that didn't seem like a good plan to Fabian. So ToPerform needed someone who knows his way around internationally. They contacted Han Smidt, theme specialist in international business at Ik Ben Drents Ondernemer (IBDO). As theme specialist, he serves as a practical expert and first point of contact that helps companies become "export-ready" or refine their international strategy.

'Han knows the bottlenecks and knows where to go,' says Fabian. 'And what he doesn't know, he knows how to find. He is as pragmatic as I am. There are always opportunities somewhere. You just have to rake them together.'

Of course the opportunities in Europe were also discussed. However, Fabian prefers to look at the Middle East and Asia. According to him, that is where the greatest opportunities lie. "In Europe, and therefore also in the Netherlands, the chemical industry is not doing so well," he argues. 'Many companies are falling over and there is often more talk about budget cuts than innovation.'