
Vlad Bacalu
Senior Vice President, Strategic & Technical Services, Amentum
AI and Asset Reliability
Vlad Bacalu is SVP leading the technology strategy for Amentum. He has over 30 years of experience in management, creating and implementing solutions to drive bottom line performance. Vlad is the Past Chair of SMRP, a board member and Past Chair of GFMAM. He has a MS in Electrical Engineering.
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Tirwirei Bingudza
Director & Principal Consultant
Binmak
Creating Value and Cost Competitiveness Through Asset Optimisation & Focused Improvement
Tirwirei Bingudza is an experienced Director, Engineer and Strategist with a demonstrated international track record of working in Engineering, IT, Technology Development, Physical Asset Management, Strategy Development as well as Operational and Executive Management in Mining & Metals, Mortgage Banking, Real Estate and Manufacturing. Tirwirei is an accomplished professional who is skilled in Business Management, Business Performance Improvement, Process Engineering, Engineering, Project Management, Technology Development, Digital Transformation, IIoT, Strategy Development and Physical Asset Management. His diverse International experience from USA, Chile, Brazil, The Philippines, Venezuela, Botswana, Madagascar, Namibia, Ireland, Zimbabwe and South Africa gives in insights and perspectives that add significant value to the diverse range of clients that he serves. |
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Siviwe Bunge
Reliability Engineer, Ekurhuleni Water Care Company
De-mystifying asset management, asset value realization, reliability and maintenance management for quick and measurable outcomes
Siviwe Humelton Bunge holds a BTech Degree in Mechanical Engineering from CPUT since 2012, he also holds a BSc (Honours) Degree in Electromechanical Engineering from UCT since 2015, a Master of Science (MSc) in Oil and Gas Engineering from Wits University since 2019, and various Management Certificates in Operations, Business Management, Business Development, Investment Management. He is a registered candidate engineer with the Engineering Council of South Africa (ECSA). He is also a member of the South African Institution of Mechanical Engineering (SAIMechE) as well as the Southern African Asset Management Association (SAAMA). He is passionate about Capital Investment and Process Optimisation through value realisation, reliability and asset care.
He has more than 8 years’ experience working in energy, water and mining industries in South Africa. |

David Coetzee
Physical Asset Management Specialist, Royal HaskoningDHV
Linking BIM to Asset Management: How to Maximise the Value of Digital Information in the Management of Infrastructure Assets
Dave Coetzee has M Dip Tech in Structural Engineering, an MSc and an MBA, he is also. He is also a Certified Asset Management Assessor. He started his career in municipal construction and then moved into a structural design office followed by a long stint as a project manager. After this he became involved in engineering systems development and from there moved into physical asset management, where he has operated for the last seventeen years.
Dave’s training and broad experience in the infrastructure engineering sector, including, construction, design, municipal management, project management and systems development, provides a solid basis for his current role as a physical asset management specialist.
His area of interest is building asset management and assisting Clients and asset owners to optimise their portfolios by better understanding their infrastructure and how to scientifically and systematically manage it to maximise return on investment.
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Dr Jasper L. Coetzee
Managing Director, AMTech
The Seven Assets of Asset Management
Dr Jasper L. Coetzee is the founder of AM-Tech, and the principal of the Terotechnica Asset Management College. They develop Physical Asset Management Leaders, and do training in Asset Management and Maintenance principles for people in industry. He has a PhD in Industrial Engineering, focussing on Reliability Centred Maintenance, he is a fellow of the International Society of Engineering Asset Management. |
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Toni De Klerk
Group Risk and Compliance Manager, Pragma Holdings (Pty) Ltd
Enabling Adaptability in a Crisis Context – The Role of Asset Management Processes, Systems and Tools in Shifting Social Systems at Scale
Toni started her educational journey as a law student and graduated as a psychology major. Post-graduate, she obtained a MPhil in Corporate Strategy from GIBS. She currently spends her time in pursuit of disrupting how industry does compliance and seeks to embed multi-disciplinary risk management philosophies into EAM practice. |

Willem de Vos
Focused Improvement Engineer, Pragma
Lowering carbon emissions in Fuel Retail facilities management
Willem, a qualified mechanical engineer, is passionate about simplifying the complexity of asset management, solving problems and putting practical improvements on the table. In his current role as Focused Improvement Engineer at Pragma, he works across various departments, projects, operations and HSSE. He gets to challenge himself in defining the real problem and coming up with the best suitable solution that will improve performance, while bringing down costs and mitigating risks for the client. Willem closely follows developments in engineering and actively expands his personal knowledge to the benefit of his clients. |
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Lee Govender
Civil Engineer II, Sasol
Building Resilient and smart asset management systems for civil assets in Sasol
Lee is a University of Pretoria graduate with a BENG in Civil Engineering. #TuksOfNiks! He has been in the civil and structural maintenance space for 8 years together with a specialized and talented team of engineers. |
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Karen Greyling
Academy Business Development Manager, Pragma Academy
A Successful Approach to Asset Management Training
Karen Greyling is the Pragma Academy Business Development Manager and helps asset intensive organisations to structure and implement winning training solutions that ensure their teams have the required knowledge and skills to achieve asset management excellence.
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Craig Henry
Managing Director – CER Asset Management
Case study: Municipal viability from an infrastructure management perspective
Craig Henry has a master’s degree in engineering management; registered Professional Engineer and Accredited Facilities Professional; has 32 years of built-environment, industrial and infrastructure asset management; consults in integrated facility management and municipal infrastructure management, and lectures at post graduate level in Facility Management. |
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Andre Jordaan
Partner Consultant, Pragma
Case study in using data to facilitate decision making (which asset be the most cost effective to acquire)
André Jordaan has 20 years’ experience in the industry and has a B.Engineer (Mechanical) and an MBA from the University of Stellenbosch. He consults in AM Strategy, focussed improvement, AM training and using financials e.a. to facilitate decision making. He is married with 2 young kids and loves participating in sport. |
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Francois Joubert
Director: Asset Management & Performance, Aurecon
What's next for Asset Management in Southern Africa, "Lessons Learned from Down Under"
Francois is an Asset Management Strategy Specialist who works with his clients to link assets to corporate strategy in order to enable business outcomes. He is a former SAAMA councillor and has implemented asset management improvement projects in several countries. He is currently based in Perth, Australia. |

Kiren Maharaj
Founder and Chairperson: Trenex (Pty) Ltd & Chairperson: South African National Energy Association (SANEA)
Sustainability and Asset Management – creating leverage in the just energy transition
Kiren is a dynamic leader and passionate energy professional with over 25 years’ experience at strategic, operational and management level as an executive in Africa’s foremost power utility and in the private sector in construction, engineering and infrastructure. She has strategically directed, governed, and overseen the safe and effective production of electricity from over 14 000 Megawatts of coal fired power generation. She headed up a R40 bn division, accountable for the management of procurement, contracts, operations, logistics and the associated quality, technical and environmental issues of primary energy inputs for power generation. |
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Berzel Matiyenga
Reliability Engineer, Binmak Corporation
Enhancing Asset Reliability, Availability, Maintainability & Safety through Digitalisation and Real-Time Asset Health Monitoring
Experienced Reliability Engineer with demonstrated history of working in the mining, manufacturing, power and utilities industries. Has a deep understanding of Digitalization Strategies, AI, Big Data, IoT and IIoT solutions. Skilled in Asset Health and Performance Monitoring, Project Management, Plant Operations, SCADA, Asset Management Consultation, Cloud Analytics, and Energy Modelling. |
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Christoff Müller
SAMP Operations Lead, Sebenzana
The Influence of Events on Risk Perception
Experienced project engineer with a demonstrated working knowledge of process design, project planning and commissioning. Successfully completed a Masters in Project Management, specialising in knowledge management. Currently working as a business process engineer and operations manager on a knowledge management system for the asset management industry. |

Nomaphelo Ndzundzu
Asset Management, Zutari
Human-centred design in Asset Management
A mechanical engineer by profession. Nomaphelo has spent over 10 years in Operations and her passion as a consultant is to incorporate principles of reliability engineering and operational excellence at the highest level of the organization. I believe making policy makers conscious of the impact their decisions make to the people on the shop floor will result in a more integrated and effective organizational strategies for infrastructure asset management. Through human centred design the organizational asset management system can be tailored to the unique culture and needs of the organization as opposed to applying blanket approach to asset management. |
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Boudewijn Neijens
CMO, Copperleaf
Machine Learning Applied to Capital Planning
Boudewijn holds a MEng from the University of Brussels, and an MBA from INSEAD in France. He is the CMO at Copperleaf in Vancouver, Canada. He chairs the Canada committees at ISO’s TC251 on asset management systems (ISO 55000) and at IEC's TC123 on management of networked power assets. |
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Dr Emmanuel Ngcobo
Chairperson of the Centre for Municipal Asset Management (CMAM-SA)
The Sustainable Outlook
Public Servant in Local Government (16 years-experience) . 7 Years – eThekwini Municipality; 9 Years - iLembe District Municipality. Chairperson of the Centre for Municipal Asset Management (CMAM-SA) Vice-President of the Chartered Institute of Government Finance, Audit & Risk Officers (CIGFARO); Member of the South African Local Government Association (SALGA) Finance Working Group, Academic Advisory Board Member for the Durban University of Technology (Public Management & Economics) and the Tshwane University of Technology (Public Finance); Chairperson of the Noble Leaders International |

Tonyson Nyabote
Technology and Application Developer, Binmak Corporation
The importance of IoT Smart Sensors in achieving operational and maintenance excellence in the 4th Industrial Revolution
Tonyson Nyabote is a Senior Engineer who specializes in building Cutting Edge AI Powered Condition Monitoring Technologies at Binmak Corporation. |
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Juan Pieterse
Engineer, Eskom SOC Holdings Ltd
High pressure feedwater heaters replacement optimisation
Professionally registered Mechanical Engineer with 10+ years’ experience in the South-African power sector. Master of Engineering received from the Centre for Asset Integrity Management at University of Pretoria for research conducted on lifecycle optimisation of indirect contact heat exchangers. Passionate about data driven asset integrity management and aspire to a career this field. |
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Bianca Rode
Senior Engineer,Sebenzana
Irrational Risk – The Human Factor in Risk Based Asset Management
Bianca Rode is a metallurgical engineer with a passion for data management. Working with consultancies have taken her all over Southern Africa, where she has been involved in a variety of industries. Her current role at Sebenzana APP involves optimizing how organizations perceive and interact with data. |

Abram Mashego
SAMP engineer (Metallurgical), Sebenzana
Digitizing metallographic replica intake and evaluation results
Abram is a metallurgical engineer (Candidate) from Middelburg, Mpumalanga. He obtained his B.Eng. degree at the University of Pretoria, then worked in the physical metallurgy field before joining Sebenzana Consulting in 2021 as SAMP junior engineer.
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Caroline van Heerden
Physical Asset Management Engineer, IMQS
Reflections on Infrastructure Maintenance Budgeting Tactics in the Public Sector
Caroline van Heerden started her career at Transnet Port Terminal working at Cape Town harbour, where she gained hands-on experience in maintenance and reliability. She then joined IMQS in 2017 as a Maintenance Management Business Analyst. After becoming a Certified Asset Management Assessor, she moved to the Professional Services team and supports clients in their Asset Management practice improvement initiatives. |
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Abraham Van Zyl Fourie
Director / Co-Founder, ABEOD
Advantages of using drones and emerging technologies in asset management.
Abraham attained his Civil Engineering degree in 2009. Since then, he specialised in the field of asset management, attaining extensive experience in the day-to-day workings of government institutions. In 2017, he started ABEOD; a company that strives to develop simplistic management strategies that optimise the workflows and financial turnover of these institutions. |

Dr Chris von Holdt
Client Director: Advisory, Zutari
Leveraging lifecycle analytics for cross-asset optimisation
Chris’ specialisation is centred around supporting businesses with large infrastructure portfolios enhance their strategy, infrastructure management practices, processes and supporting systems. This typically requires working with management and operations across the breadth of the organisation. He has worked across South Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa, Australia, South-East Asia and the USA. |
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Chantel von Saint Ange
Risk and Compliance Manager, Pragma
Lowering carbon emissions in Fuel Retail facilities management
Chantel, an industrial engineer, has extensive experience developing solutions from the opportunities that arise from the complexity of fuel retail facilities management. She has an exceptional aptitude for data analysis, interpretation and scrutinising management systems to identify improvements and provide assurance. She reduces risk and increases asset compliance for clients. |
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Abdullah Wahbeh
Global Practice Leader, GE Digital
Pitfalls of Artificial Intelligence in Predictive Analytics
Strategist leader with twenty years of experience working in Predictive Maintenance, Asset Performance Management, AI, Digital Solutions & Transformation, Rotating Equipment & troublshooting, Comissioning of Gas Turbines, IOT and Cloud Computing. Responsible for the global go-to-market strategy and launch of Predictive Maintenance, enablement plans, and sales strategy. |

Hein Welman
BIM Lead, Southern Africa, Royal HaskoningDHV
Linking BIM to Asset Management: How to Maximise the Value of Digital Information in the Management of Infrastructure Assets
Hein has 17 years’ experience in the buildings and building services industry specializing in Building Information Modelling and Information Management of new and existing assets.
He serves as a BIM Lead responsible for incorporating all disciplines in an integrated BIM environment, implementation of global standards and for pioneering new methods and technologies. While his primary focus is on information management, processes, policy and interoperability., his main responsibility is to accelerate and implement BIM for RHDHV Southern Africa in alignment with RHDHV Global BIM standards.
With an interest in the entire life-cycle of information and associated digital assets, he has taken an in-depth journey over the last few years to assist asset owners in their digital transformation process. This entails aligning policy and practice to ensure information are requested and received in line with ISO19650 standards. This ensures interoperability and structured data to enable asset management and future-ready assets for digital twins. |
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Vulindlela Zikhali
Civil Engineer, Sasol
Building Resilient and smart asset management systems for civil assets in Sasol
Vulindlela Zikhali is an MSc graduate of UKZN who forms part of the Sasol Secunda Operations Civil Engineering Inspection Management team. He specializes in civil and structural asset maintenance and together with his team has developed the plant’s civil and structural asset management digital platform, AMMSTRAT. |
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