Kelvin Jacobs

As the co-owner of a manufacturing company which focuses on the production of renewable fuel such as Biodiesel and the manufacturing of Eco-friendlier cleaning products my core responsibilities centered around:

• Providing Strategic direction;
• Liaise with funding institutions;
• Budgeting;
• Operational and People Management;
• Research and Product Development;
• Customer Relationship Management;
• Responsible for ISO 9001:2015 implementation;
• Responsible for all internal and external audits e.g from the Department of Labour;
• External Laboratory interface;
• Spearheaded successful business development initiatives aligned with company's strategy and core competencies.
• Documented processes and drafted SOPs to comply with regulations and company policies.

I successfully started this business from scratch with only one employee and managed to grow this business substantially against all odds.

Under my leadership we have grown our revenue from a mere 4-digit sales figure to just under 10-million-rand revenue as well as increasing our staff compliment to 10 employees during the pandemic.

Against all expectations and during difficult pandemic times I managed to improve production figures from 5000L to 20000L per day to reach record breaking figures of over 1 million liters of hand sanitizers produced for the South African Market and Mozambique within the customers timeline and budget.

One of the successes that our team have achieved under my leadership is the award received from SEDA (Small Enterprise Development Agency) and Sasol for the Highest Comparative Growth during the pandemic in 2020.

I saved a major client over 5 million rand in costs during this one project.

Fischer Tropsch process and Reforming (Hydrogen generation)

• Discuss budget and work agenda with relevant business unit;
• Direct, influence and support Iron (Fe) FT portfolio within Sasol Synfuels and Sasol Wax;
• Established strategy alignment (Fe-FT & Reforming) between business and the development community (Research and Technology);
• Responsible for technology governance and developing technology roadmaps;
• Liaise frequently with Synfuels and R&D in terms of development work;
• Direct and coordinate Technology portfolios in response to and influencing Sasol's technology strategy;
• IP Governance, exploitation of opportunity and protection of technology competitive advantage;
• Establishing new and nurturing existing technology partnerships;
• Communicated with executive and operational team to maximize development efficiencies and resolve technology issues;
• Led technology selection and rollout, focusing on organizational planning and supplier service-level agreements;
• Guided organizational technology strategy and roadmaps;
• Updated customers and senior leaders on progress and roadblocks;
• Worked closely with management teams to plan, develop and execute technical strategies aligned to client's vision.

• Setting up and managing Service Level Agreements (SLA) and budget;
• Responsible for Fuel Quality in Natref refinery – problem solving (troubleshooting) thereby saving costs and protecting Sasol's brand;
• Manage and nurture relationships between Fuels technology and Natref refinery (Sasol and TotalEnergies);
• Responsible for fuel imports from Durban to Natref (physically execute and coordinate) from technical and quality perspective; Ensuring that 40 million liters of diesel arrives safely and within specification;
• Give laboratory guidance in terms of specification changes;
• Draft waivers for off-spec product;
• Render technical support in terms of Clean Fuels II;
• Self-motivated, with strong sense of personal responsibility;
• Participated in team projects, demonstrating ability to work collaboratively and effectively;
• Demonstrated strong organizational and time management skills while managing multiple projects;
• Used critical thinking to break down problems, evaluate solutions and make decisions;
• Resolved problems that would have cost the company millions, improved operations and provided exceptional service.

• Managed the Market Investigations group & Short term chemistry group (10 employees);
• Setting up and managing of Transport fuels and Lubricants budgets;
• Setting up and managing Service Level Agreements (SLA) with laboratories;
• Ensure and improve service delivery to all customers;
• Drafting the group’s Performance agreements & Personal development plans and guiding younger team members;
• Interacting with National and International laboratories;
• Participated and led teams in Root Cause Analysis and problem solving;
• Involved in Clean Fuels I (Lead phase out) and ensuring compliance;
• Setting up of Short term chemistry’s processes and systems;
• Setting up of electronic request logging system for customers and liaising with IM to finalize request logging system;
• Providing training on systems to all customers;
• Involved in Product and Method Development;
• Keeping track of Short term chemistry BSC information;
• Managed Fuels Research team that successfully set up SCI Fuels laboratory and ensuring quality compliance;
• Fostered diversity in short term chemistry team;
• Used strong analytical and problem-solving skills to develop effective solutions for challenging situations.

• Customer Interface (Resolve Market complaints, Fuel quality);
• Networking with depot authorities (Quality Management);
• SHERQ responsibilities;
• Coordinating the changeover of Sasol Oil’s old MSDS to the new SAP compliant MSDS for all their products;
• Was assigned the secretary role for the Sherq meetings held by the Sasol Oil Board members;
• Represented Sasol Oil on the ROSE foundation as proxy;
• Collating and Consolidating the SHERQ data for the Board members;
• Responsible for Sasol Oil data during the KPMG sustainability audits;
• Distributing CAIA Reports to the various business divisions and assessing and compiling the completed report for submission;
• Coordinate the SH&E Sustainability Reports and Board Reports for Sasol Oil on a quarterly basis;
• Ensured that the formulations and quality control sheets at the ESA (Engen, Sasol, Agip Lubricants) blend plant in Durban are up to date and within specification;
• Customer Relationship Management.

• Application research;
• Conducted experiments in laboratory environment for product development purposes;
• Simultaneously managed several complex projects, meeting all pertinent milestones;
• Prioritized project tasks after discussions with research department team;
• Interpretation/Analysis of data;
• SHE Representative and secretary;
• Formulations and Optimization of Sasol wax product range;
• Hands-on property evaluation of polishes;
• Report writing;
• Networking with various chemical suppliers
• Performed complex troubleshooting and assisted in leading initiatives to solve challenging scientific problems with assays or instrumentation.

• R&D, Interpretation of experimental results;
• Execution of experiments;
• Successfully completed my M.Sc practical work in this group;
• Literature research;
• Optimizing data analysis;
• Conducted experiments in laboratory environment for product development purposes; and
• Documented changes during experiments, noting unexpected issues arising during research activities.