Data Gumbo continues to feature team member profiles to showcase the diverse talent behind our growing company. This month, we talked with Fred Tyler, Business Development Manager.
As an energy professional with two decades of experience in global sales and business development in oilfield services, Fred has a distinguished track record of overseeing domestic and international drilling operations and water projects/fracking operations. Currently, Fred is aiding in the transition of several oil and gas operators and service companies to blockchain-powered and secured smart contracts. As well, he is focusing on tangential industrial sectors including waste management and recycling services as Data Gumbo moves into new markets that will benefit from transactional certainty in commercial relationships.
Welcome Fred. You’ve been with the company for a while now. Let‘s dig into your journey and extensive industry experience.
First, can you give us a short overview of your history with Data Gumbo and how you’ve seen the company grow?
When I first started at Data Gumbo, the company was tied to the energy industry, but the challenges we were solving for in energy could also be solved for across other industries. We started out working mostly in upstream, oilfield services and completions. Today, we create smart contract value propositions for numerous industries and I couldn’t be more excited for our future.
With deep roots in oil and gas, how are you seeing digital transformation playing out in the industry?
Digital transformation is driving efficiencies and cost savings that have never been realized. Even today, it is common to see paper-based payments, manual checks and disparate systems that require an Excel spreadsheet to chart expenses. The new digital oilfield is bringing changes that disseminate data in instantaneous, accurate and transparent ways to increase productivity, streamline operations and reduce transactional and informational friction. Using technology, operators are able to drill more wells at less cost, surpassing safety and efficiency barriers. Service companies are adopting automated performance contracts via smart contracts that enable them to function at peak performance. There’s a lot of really cool innovation occurring right now with some of my favorites in the subsea.
Why are you now targeting waste management and recycling? What have you learned as the company moves into these new verticals?
I love the circular economy of a waste-to-value model. It’s fascinating to see how industry is tackling emissions by using methane to feed the grid or other creative alternatives to landfills. Data Gumbo’s smart contracts can be used for commodity haulage. For example, we’ve successfully run projects with produced water but the data points can translate to other tracking abilities that can enable any waste provider to monitor trucking and waste in real time. Many of today’s waste companies are data rich, but the backend office hasn’t caught up. At Data Gumbo, we link the two together in ways the industry hasn’t achieved before.
What technology trends excite you most?
Blockchain! Its ability to supply trust in commercial relationships is huge, plus the technology has enabled touchless transactions which limits human errors and administrative overhead. Other exciting technology trends include robotics and artificial intelligence (AI).
Where do you see Data Gumbo in five years?
In five years, I see Data Gumbo pioneering blockchain and its cutting-edge applications by leading the first industrial smart contract network to automate commercial relationships for the largest companies in the world. I am honored to be a part of this team working diligently to transform business processes.
