Podcast
Rui Correia arrived at Sonae in 1994 and remembers being surprised, “because the boss listened to my opinion. I thought ‘But who am I?'”. Today he is executive president of Sonae Arauco, one of the largest wood-based solutions companies in the world, which has 23 factories in nine countries and employs around 2600 workers
In Portugal, cement and concrete still dominate, but it is a matter of time before wood starts to grow and gain more space in the construction industry, considers Rui Correia.
Visiting the Innovators League, the executive president of Sonae Arauco also explains how the group takes advantage old furniture, broken pallets, shavings, sawdust or demolition wood to make different types of panels – “a lot of the furniture that people buy, particularly if they go to an IKEA, is old, reused, recycled furniture”, he adds.
He criticizes the use of wood for energy production – “using wood to produce pellets is as bad as burning coal”, and also talks about Belmiro de Azevedo and his management culture. Listen to him on the Expresso podcast.
Other topics you might hear throughout the conversation
“Using wood to produce pellets is as bad as burning coal”
“Sending old furniture to a landfill is a crime, at the end of the day wood is CO2”
“A lot of the furniture that people buy, particularly if they go to an IKEA, is old, reused, recycled furniture”
“In the USA, single-family houses are almost all built in wood; in Scotland, around 80%. In Portugal, this tradition does not exist, but it is a matter of time”
“The forest, the wood, absorbs CO2. If this wood, instead of being burned, is used as a material in the construction of a building, it will be preserved for tens or hundreds of years”
“When I joined Sonae, I was 26 or 27 years old and I was very surprised, because the boss listened to my opinion. I remember thinking: ‘But who am I?'”
The podcast that tells us what is innovative and differentiating is being done by companies in Portugal. In the “League of Innovators”, Elisabete Miranda and Pedro Lima talk to managers, directors and professionals who tell us stories that conquered the market and are contributing to the economic transformation of the country and its image. They tell us about the victories that brought them here, but also about the anxieties, the competitors they envy, the managers they admire, the professionals they have and the profiles they need to hire. Every week, on Wednesdays.
