Philipp Raichle helps Xylem customers all over Australia to solve their water challenges. As Product and Marketing Manager for Treatment in Oceania, Philipp works with municipalities, farmers and mining companies to provide more sustainable water solutions.
In 2018, Philipp participated in the Young Water Leaders conference at Singapore Water Week. He was also the architect and project manager for a touchscreen tool, Xylem World of Water, that shows Xylem’s solutions for the entire water cycle on an interactive map.
Described by colleagues as a well-respected team player and subject matter expert, Philipp is known for working with leadership, sales and service teams to deliver great results.
What is a typical day at work like?
A typical day for me might start with commuting an hour from Sydney City to the Xylem office at Eastern Creek, where I work with our sales and application support teams. I help with product selection and pricing for Xylem’s treatment solutions.
Or I might start the day by taking a taxi to the airport and catching a plane to one of our 15 regional Xylem locations in Oceania to either support our teams in customer meetings, provide training, or attend trade shows and Xylem customer events.
I’m lucky to have a role within Xylem that offers me constant positive challenges, never gets boring or stale, and allows me to develop a deep insight into all facets of the business.
What kinds of challenges are your customers facing?
The water challenges are vastly different depending on their geographical location and environmental circumstances. Municipal customers on the east coast, for example, have to deal with an ever-increasing population, aging infrastructure and drastically increased costs for energy and labor.
Smaller municipalities and industrial customers in central Australia, for example farmers and miners, face great challenges like establishing a long-term sustainable drinking water supply or having enough water for their cattle stock.
In western Australia, they have great challenges from high saline in the groundwater and a generally very arid climate. Challenges in the northeast of the country include controlling water runoff from farms and the release of nutrients into the Great Barrier Reef.
How do you help solve these water challenges?
Internally I mainly support our sales teams around the Oceania region with my expertise in designing water and wastewater treatment solutions. These solutions ultimately help our clients manage or overcome their challenges.
In addition to internal support, I engage in external activities such as presenting Xylem’s conventional and advanced treatment solutions to consultants, municipalities and industrial customers. I help educate and raise awareness in the market about potential solutions to certain challenges.
What has been your favorite project at Xylem?
One of the most interesting and rewarding projects that I have had the chance to work on, during my almost 10 years at Xylem, was developing an interactive city touchscreen environment. The touchscreen aims to present the full breath of Xylem’s product portfolio, from water intake to returning water to the environment.
This Xylem World of Water tool allowed me to discover the depth of what Xylem has to offer and how many great solutions we have to help our customers with. And I had the amazing chance to engage with many great talents from other Xylem divisions and commercial teams around the world, who all supported me with true passion.