Meet the team: Olavo Monken
Our new senior design engineer, Olavo Monken, hails from sunny Belo Horizonte, Brazil, where he did most of his studies, combined with a year in Ottawa, Canada.
So, Olavo, tell us a little more about yourself
“I’d be happy to. I have spent the last 13 years (10 of those in the Netherlands) working across a variety of fields: from bringing large, complex contemporary art installations to life, through developing medical equipment, to ultimately focusing on consumer goods and mobility.
“Each of these steps in my journey taught me something very valuable. While working with visual artist Henk Stallinga, I learned the importance of extreme technical integration and attention to detail. At Studio Stallinga, everything we did aimed to foster suspension of disbelief, to allow the observer to fully soak in the technological artwork without giving away any hint of how we achieved it.
Working in the medical industry, safety, compliance, and reliability take precedence above all else. You learn about the long-term consequences of every single decision and how to navigate strict requirements and regulations, while realizing that ultimately, we are developing products that must truly help people.
But it was during the six years I spent at Hamax designing bike trailers that I truly fell in love with mobility. There I worked on many products, carrying them from conceptualization to production support. Being part of a small but highly efficient team meant I had the opportunity to gain experience in all stages of product development and engineering.
Through many successful product launches, I built a strong foundation in turning concepts into production-ready designs, learning the key points that, when addressed early, ensure a great idea makes its way into production. There is immense joy in strolling through the city and seeing a family happily using a product you developed. You’d be hard pressed to find a better motivator in this field.”
How did you end up working as you do, and what types of projects you are interested in?
I love solving complex mechanical puzzles: building several conceptual models in my mind, trying to create an integrated solution that balances all requirements. But above all, I love doing this conceptualization exercise for products that people use in their daily lives.
As an industrial design engineer, I have focused mainly on developing solutions that elegantly address interaction, functionality, and feasibility.
When you interact with a complex product, if it looks cool, and it works effortlessly, someone had to think that through and make it possible. I want to continue working on products that give me that challenge.
Why did you want to work with MODYN
When I moved to the Netherlands in 2015 and started learning about the industrial design market here, I kept running into MODYN’s great reputation (back then Van der Veer Designers). Although I wasn’t yet focused on mobility, I already thought: How cool would it be to work with them!
Not long ago I had the pleasure of collaborating with MODYN on a project, and when I felt it was time for a new adventure, call it fate, MODYN was also looking for a senior design engineer!
What excites you in mobility right now?
Products are getting more complex. More and more solutions are being delivered in the same package, and everything is becoming a “super product.” While this is very exciting and means people are gaining access to fantastic solutions, the design industry has also become overly reliant on cheap labor and generates a lot of unrecoverable waste.
I’m excited to be part of a future (and a present) where the challenge is to deliver these super products, but in a new, circular and highly efficient way.
What are your hobbies, Olavo?
I love doing many different things: going to the gym, enjoying the amazing festivals around the Netherlands, and computer gaming.
I’m always building some personal side project, so you’ll often find me tinkering with my 3D printer or knee-deep in an Arduino program. I’m also an enthusiastic board gamer, the more complex the better. In my group, we even have a rule: if it takes less than an hour to read the manual, we won’t bother!
Be sure to connect with Olavo Monken | LinkedIn
