With the Soccer World Cup freshly wrapped up, the world has seen firsthand how teamwork, strategy, and agility lead to victory on the biggest stage. At KAEFER, we apply the same winning principles to sales and business development. By pairing AI’s precision and power with the collective intelligence of our global KAEFER teams, we’re scoring big: streamlining tender preparation, enhancing customer engagement, and winning contracts across continents.
The second module of the KAEFER SET Summit 2026 brought together experts from around the world. Panellists from the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, UK & Ireland, Brazil, Germany, and Norway shared their practical experiences and best practices using AI to advance sales and business development.
Giovani Ugarelli, KAEFER Global Sales Coordinator and summit organiser reflects:
“This session showcased how KAEFER’s global teams leverage AI to drive efficiency and continuous improvement. The exchange of best practices inspired participants to embrace digital transformation and deepen collaboration across entities, reinforcing our commitment to innovation.”
Building on this spirit of collaboration and innovation, the panel brought together experts who are harnessing AI to transform sales and business development across KAEFER’s global network. Each panellist shared practical examples of how AI can streamline processes, enhance customer engagement and drive smarter decision-making. Their insights demonstrate the power of technology and highlight the crucial role of teamwork in turning innovation into tangible business success.
Automating and accelerating tender processes
In the Netherlands, Matthijs van der Veen introduced KAEFER’s AI Chatbot, a true star striker in tender preparation. The chatbot ingests customer documents and automatically generates tailored tender summaries, inclusion/exclusion lists, and offer templates. This leads to saving valuable time and reducing errors. Matthijs highlights that teamwork across KAEFER was essential to refine and expand the chatbot’s capabilities, adapting it to different regional “playing styles” and tender formats.
“Matthijs, how has collaboration across KAEFER teams helped your AI Chatbot become a game-changer? Any memorable moments where it ‘scored’ big?”
“While I wouldn’t say the AI chatbot has had a single game-changing moment, its real value lies in consistently saving us time and ensuring we always have accurate, up-to-date information at our fingertips.
Built through collaboration across KAEFER teams, the chatbot gives us access to the right information when we need it most. That’s essential for preparing accurate proposals and making well-informed decisions.
In our business, attention to detail is what really makes the difference, and the chatbot has become an invaluable tool in helping us get those details right.”
Meanwhile, in Saudi Arabia, Lin John-Skariah shared how AI integration with Microsoft Outlook acts like a midfield maestro, allowing instant tender registration and offer submission with a single click. This innovation reduces manual work and helps the team stay ahead of the competition. John credits close collaboration with IT and CRM “teammates” for the smooth rollout and success of this integration.
“Lin, what teamwork was needed behind the scenes to get AI and Outlook working in harmony?”
“Just like a successful football team, this innovation depended on every player working together. Bringing different teams onto the same field was the biggest challenge. Our Business Development team worked closely with IT, HQ Digital Operations, and our external CRM partners to understand the tender process, simplify the workflow, and design a solution that works in our day to day operations. Everyone played their part, shared ideas, and contributed their expertise. That collaboration has been the key to moving this initiative forward.”
“How has this changed your team’s game?”
“The goal is to make tender registration as simple as a single click from Outlook. By reducing manual work, minimising the risk of missing contact details or tender opportunities, and speeding up the process, we were giving our team more time to focus on what really matters ie., preparing better proposals and delivering value to our customers. More likely in football, when you spend less time chasing the ball and more time creating opportunities and strategies, the whole team performs better.”
Turning customer feedback into actionable insights
Ciaran Clifford from the UK & Ireland introduced Your Voice Counts, an AI-powered platform that listens like a savvy coach – analysing customer feedback to spot strengths, weaknesses, and winning tactics. This tool turns mountains of data into clear, actionable insights that help the business improve and adapt. Sharing these insights across KAEFER regions helps the whole team learn and improve their playbook.
“Ciaran, can you share a moment when AI uncovered a customer insight that changed the game? How did teamwork help spread that win?”
“One example was when we used AI to analyse all of the open-text feedback from Your Voice Counts. Rather than reading hundreds of comments manually, AI helped us quickly identify the recurring themes across all of the responses.
Enhancing the commercial cycle and CRM with AI
In Brazil, Bruno Bronzatto Pereira described how AI is the all-rounder in the commercial cycle – from scouting new clients to automating follow-ups and quantity surveys. Their AI teammate, Elephan, even takes meeting notes and scores sales reps, helping the team make smarter, data-driven decisions. Bruno stresses that ongoing collaboration with global AI and sales experts has been crucial to adapting and scaling these tools for Brazil’s unique market conditions.
“Bruno, how has working with KAEFER’s global AI and sales teams helped you tailor AI tools for Brazil? What’s been the biggest win so far?”
“Working together with KAEFER’s global AI and Sales teams has been a great experience in identifying and adapting artificial intelligence tools to the reality of the Brazilian market. This collaboration always brings us many insights, allowing us to adjust solutions to local particularities, such as customer behavior and Brazil’s commercial dynamics. The greatest gain so far has been precisely this ability to customise, which enables us to automate processes from prospecting to negotiation follow-up, as well as the opportunity to have Elephan, an AI assistant, who records meetings and evaluates the sales team’s performance. This has certainly helped us make smarter, and most importantly, data-driven decisions, raising efficiency and commercial results.”
AI-Driven lead identification and personalised sales approaches
Benedikt Pirngruber from Germany explained how AI helps identify promising leads and craft personalised approaches – like a sharp forward spotting the perfect pass. This targeted strategy improves lead quality and boosts conversion chances. Benedikt shared those exchanging ideas and data with colleagues worldwide has sharpened their lead generation tactics.
“Benedikt, can you tell us about a time when AI helped you ‘score’ a lead that might have been missed? How did collaboration make that possible?”
“Using our AI-powered lead generation tool, we have managed to secure a new client that recycles magnets. This is an industry that is emerging as part of the circular economy, and new players are appearing on the market who are not part of our existing network. AI is a huge help to us in securing enquiries – and ultimately contracts – in sectors like this.”
Revolutionising field data capture and digital measurement
Finally, Christoffer Lie from Norway showcased Digisurv and PrefabBase, digital tools that banish manual measurements like a well-coordinated defense shutting down the opposition. Field workers capture insulation box measurements digitally, syncing instantly with the office for accuracy and speed. Christoffer is excited about adding AI-powered design proposals and production file generation to these tools, with collaboration across KAEFER helping push innovation forward.
“Christoffer, what’s the coolest ‘goal’ Digisurv or PrefabBase has helped you achieve? How has teamwork fuelled these innovations?”
“One of the biggest achievements of Digisurv and PrefabBase is our ability to deliver value not only to our own operations, but also directly to customers and even competitors. Whether we process insulation products through our measurement and production workflows, or provide users with direct access to do it themselves, the platform enables a seamless journey from measurement to production and installation.
What makes this truly special is its versatility. The software supports both internal and external operations while remaining highly specialised for insulation prefabrication.
Most importantly, this achievement is the result of years of teamwork across KAEFER. Innovative colleagues, experienced engineers, production and logistics teams, quality professionals, and our talented external developers have all contributed to making it possible. Built on KAEFER’s LEAN principles and supported by continuous improvement initiatives, Digisurv and PrefabBase are a great example of what can be achieved when technology and teamwork come together.”
These examples from KAEFER’s global teams show that, while AI is a powerful enabler, it is the creativity, judgement and collaboration of our people that drive success. As we embrace the opportunities that AI offers us, we remain committed to the human insight and teamwork that bring innovation to life.
As the recent Soccer World Cup showed us, it’s the blend of skill, strategy and teamwork that wins the game. Count on us!
Note: Written by humans – with a little help from GenAI. This article combines human understanding and intelligent digital tools to bring KAEFER stories to life.