Rheonics brings together a team of experts from the leading universities and global companies to build cutting edge fluid process monitoring instruments. Rheonics is advised by an advisory board made of leaders from the industrial automation & process industry.
Rheonics’ products are already used in a broad range of markets from food processing to downhole oil & gas exploration and production by core brand customers like Shell, BASF, Baker Hughes, Nestle, Sulzer and Buhler. We are growing our markets through a combination of innovative technology, robust products and focus on ease of use. We believe the fluid sensing market for density and viscosity is on the cusp of revolution through the introduction of stable, reliable, robust, plug-and-play instruments.
Rheonics solutions are backed by more than 30 years of research from ETH Zurich, one of world’s top 10 universities. With more than 200 years collective experience, it brings together seasoned experts in the fields of mechanics, electronics, and fluid dynamics whose mission is to build customer-driven application-specific fluid sensing solutions. The founders of the company are Dr. Sunil Kumar, CEO; Professor Jürg Dual, Professor at the Institute of Mechanical Systems at ETH; Professor emeritus Mahir Sayir, ex-head of IMES at ETH; Dr. Joe Goodbread, Chief Technology Officer and inventor of numerous innovative fluid sensing systems, Dr. Klaus Haeusler, who has developed a wide range of novel fluid solutions for medical, food and polymer applications. We produce robust and reliable solutions based on a foundation of time- and field tested technologies, backed by a broad & expanding portfolio of intellectual property.
Dr. Sunil Kumar
Chief Executive OfficerSunil has extensive experience in the sensors and energy sector, having worked in a variety of roles in engineering and research in his early career. Most recently Sunil worked at Baker Hughes where he headed global engineering for Drilling Services. Sunil founded companies that successfully commercialized innovative products. He graduated with Bachelors in Aerospace from Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, Masters in Mechanical engineering from University of California, Irvine and Ph.D in Electrical engineering from Imperial College, London where he developed the Seis-SP seismometer that is part of the main payload for the NASA Insight mission to Mars (2018). He is a prolific inventor with over 30 patents and multiple peer reviewed papers.
Sunil’s vision of creating sensors for fluid property measurement that revolutionizes in-line process monitoring, control and optimization serves as the charter for rheonics. He holds overall responsibility for the business performance including the strategic direction and culture of the company.
Dr. Joe Goodbread
Chief Technical OfficerJoe is a founding member of the team that developed Rheonics’ core technologies over the past 30 years. He established and directed the Experimental Mechanics Laboratory at the Institute for Mechanics, ETH Zurich. He has developed substantial IP in the field of fluid properties sensors with 10 granted patents and multiple pending. He has a BSE in Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering Science from Princeton University, a MS in Biomechanics from Stanford University, and a Dr. Techn. Sc. from the ETH Zurich in Biomechanics. Early in his career, Joe worked with SRI (Stanford Research Institute, then) and thereafter headed the IMES labs at ETH Zurich. Joe is also a trained psychotherapist and a founder of the Institute of Process Work. He is an author of 4 books on the subject.
Joe’s extensive research and engineering skills form the technical core of the rheonics’ products and services. His passion for innovation and tackling impossible challenges are creating industry leading products.
Dr. Klaus Hausler
Resident Sensor PhysicistKlaus is co-founder of Rheonics and an inventor of multiple fluid sensing devices for both Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids. Klaus has over 35 years of experience developing sensors for process and biological applications. He has invented viscosity and density solutions for applications ranging from DNA PCR to food processes that form the basis for his multiple patents and papers published in international peer reviewed journals.
Klaus started his career in the watch industry and oversaw the quality control at Rolex in Biel, Switzerland subsequently moving to IBM in USA working on the next generation computing. He has a diploma in Watch engineering from Technikum Biel, a Diploma in Micro-Mechanical Engineering from University of Neuchatel followed by a Dr.es.sci.tech. in Viscoelasticity from Institute of Mechanics at ETH Zurich. His passion for simple design and robust engineering forms the basis for rheonics products.
Dr. Vijoya Sa
Chief Operations OfficerVijoya is responsible for the day-to-day administrative management and operational functions at Rheonics. She graduated with Masters in Polymer Science from Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi and Ph.D in Materials Science and Engineering from Clemson University where she developed CNT loaded polymeric composites for bio-medical applications. Prior to joining Rheonics, she was a Material Scientist at Baker Hughes leading development of polymeric materials for use in harsh environments.
Dr. Daniel Brunner
Product Engineering ManagerDani leads the Product Engineering team at Rheonics. He graduated with Bachelors and Masters from ZHAW and worked on next generation tube sensors for fluid monitoring for his doctoral work at UiT – The Arctic University of Norway. He is passionate about product design that are built for scaleup from start.
Dr. Patrick Vogler
Electronics EngineerPatrick leads the electronics team at Rheonics. He graduated with a Bachelors, Masters and PhD in Physics from ETH Zurich, where he worked on instrumentation for ground-based gamma ray astronomy. Patrick worked at the Paul Scherrer Institute, Switzerland in the group which built the pixel detector for the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
Prof. Jürg Dual
Institute of Mechanical Systems, ETH ZurichProf. Dual has been Full Professor of Mechanics and Experimental Dynamics in the Center of Mechanics of the Institute of Mechanical Systems at the ETH Zurich since 1998. He was President of the Planning Commission of ETH Zurich from 2000-2004, and of the University Assembly from 2008-2012.
Jürg studied mechanical engineering at the ETH Zurich. He then spent two years on a Fulbright grant at the University of California in Berkeley, where he graduated with a M.S. and a M. Eng. degree in mechanical engineering followed by a Dr. sc. techn. degree at the ETH Zurich. He is a Fellow of the ASME, member of the SATW (Swiss Academy of Technical Sciences) and Honorary Member of the German Association for Materials Research and Testing. Jürg is a co-founder of Rheonics and inventor of multiple technology in Rheonics products. He has published extensively on viscometry and chaired work groups & conferences.
Prof. Mahir Sayir
Professor Emeritus since 2005, ETH ZurichProf. Sayir was Full Professor of Mechanics and head of the Center for Mechanics at ETH Zurich beginning in October 1976. He retired end of March 2005. He obtained his PhD from the ETH under Prof. Ziegler and was elected assistant professor of mechanics in 1969 and to full Professor in 1976. This was also the year he began supplementing his theoretical research with new experimental projects and when he directed his interests mainly towards applied dynamics. According to his credo, a professor of mechanics should prove his competence in both research and teaching. In 1985 he was “Lady Davis Visiting Professor” at the Technion in Haifa, Israel, and in 1987 he was invited as “Russel Spring Honour Professor” at the Department of Mechanical Engineering of the University of California at Berkeley.
Prof. Sayir is one of the co-founders of rheonics. He is co-inventor on many of rheonics’ patents and a source of strength for the team.
We’re building a business that is good for profits and good for the planet, one that help companies save time, energy, and money.
rheonics is poised for the future.
We produce robust and reliable solutions based on a foundation of time- and field tested technologies, backed by a broad & expanding portfolio of intellectual property. Our current palette of products includes a series of process density & viscosity instruments.
Fluid intelligence leads to better utilization of resources
We envision a world of material transformation that uses materials and energy in the most efficient way to deliver sustainable processes.
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To build the team’s extensive technical expertise in fluid sensing into commercial products that our customers can use to control and optimize their processes: increasing efficiency, margins and sustainability.
Measure. Control. Optimize. Monetize.