Matthias Willems

Matthias graduated in 2019 and works as a Mechanical Engineer at Deprez Construct via Verhaert Consulting.

Can you tell us something more about yourself?

“At Deprez construct I work as a mechanical engineer within engineering team, together we realize big and small projects with a touch of innovation. Deprez Construct is a company active in the food, recycling and bulk sector. I work mainly in the food processing projects.”

What have you been working on lately?

“In the last year, I have been able to develop and contribute to many interesting projects. For example, I recently helped standardize two new types of conveyor belts. This standardization was necessary because of the size of a large emerging project and to finish it within the intended time. This project consists of more than 3000 meters of conveyor belts that passes through a variety of constructions and machinery to process potatoes. Even though standardization is already challenging, this project was especially complicated because Deprez works very customer-oriented and every last centimeter of the customers factory will be used to maximize production. They also had to be suitable for future projects. These requirements made it very difficult to draw a standard within all this. However, after a lot of consultations between engineering and production, we managed to succeed. Of these two new state-of-the-art conveyor belt types, many have already been produced with a lot of positive feedback. Because of an in-house production site, you experience the whole process of drawing a machine until it works. Personally, I find this a huge added value and whenever I see it working it gives me a boost of satisfaction. Also, this way necessary improvements can be communicated directly to the engineering department. That’s how you learn a lot!”

What are your plans for the coming year?

“My objectives for the coming year are to successfully complete the current project and further optimize the standardization of the new types of conveyor belts. After this, I would like to delve deeper into the development of new machines and more complex structures.”