HUNTSVILLE, Ala. – The Aviagen® North America team was pleased to get together with their Canadian customers and industry colleagues on Feb. 8 and 9 at the National Poultry Show in London, Ontario.
Pictured L-R: Billy Hufford, VP Aviagen North America Commercial Operations; Matt Klassen, Canadian Account Manage; Harold Echeverry, Senior Veterinarian; Mark Belanger, Canadian Technical Service Manager; Emily Simmons, Customer Service & Support Supervisor; Caroline Lumb, Marketing Generalist and Taylor Davis, Digital Marketing Specialist
The team shared Aviagen’s strategy of “breeding for welfare and sustainability” and its benefits to the Canadian poultry industry. Due to this balanced breeding approach, strong performance and livability are dominant traits of Aviagen’s Ross® birds. These qualities combine with excellent welfare and sustainability, adding up to significant advantages for Canadian poultry producers, the consumer markets they supply with healthy chicken meat, and the planet.
Breeding innovation and customer success
According to Aviagen North America President Marc de Beer, the company’s progress in breeding for welfare and sustainability is driven by “a commitment to research and development and innovation, and leveraging these to help our customers succeed.”
A good example is Aviagen’s new “remote customer service” technology. “With this solution, whether they are on a Canadian farm or hatchery, or anywhere in the world, poultry producers get instant advice on their challenges and insight on ways to best improve the performance, efficiency and health of their flocks,” added de Beer.
The tool employs innovative live-streaming capabilities – along with bonded cellular networking, mesh WiFi, VR/AR headsets and software, and state-of-the-art cameras and screens – to connect Aviagen specialists with poultry producers around the globe. When a user onsite wears the VR headset with its special goggles, the expert at the other end, who is watching on a screen, can see what the wearer sees in real time. They can even zoom in to see detail in relevant areas, and then offer needed guidance.
As evidence of the advanced remote live-streaming capabilities of the tool, Aviagen’s Virtual Marketing and Commercial Support Manager Wouter Lassauw addressed an audience at the show in Canada from his office in Huntsville, Ala., while demonstrating a special diagnostics procedure at a customer farm in Arkansas. On site at the farm to facilitate this new remote customer service tool were Aviagen’s Antonio Beitia, Technical Development Team Program Member, and Gary Hogue, Regional Business Manager.
“Aviagen thanks the Canadian Poultry Industry Council and Western Fair District for a successful 62nd National Poultry Show. Aviagen shares with these organizations a commitment to strengthening the industry in Canada and the communities it serves,” concluded Matt Klassen, Aviagen’s Canadian Account Manager.