Joe Wayman has led sales teams in pharma, pet food, and animal health for industry leaders. Petabolix, his new venture, is going all in on tech with a nutrition platform for individualized diets for our pets. Joe shared with us about pet nutrition, pet tech, and the opportunities in pet care.

Describe what you do.

Petabolix is the authority on pet nutrition. Our Ph. D. nutritionists and animal health experts have mapped the nutritional needs of all the dog breeds taking into account variables including life stages, activity level, body condition and more to establish unique targeted nutritional goals for each pet. So we can help find the ideal pet food and appropriate treats, supplements, and health items specifically needed for optimal health.

How diverse and inclusive is the Pet Tech Ecosystem?

The pet tech ecosystem certainly has room for diversity. The nature of tech typically relies on the universal languages of programming which allows for plenty of diversity as the industry grows.

What are the opportunities in the Pet Tech Ecosystem?

The opportunities for pet tech reach literally every aspect of a pets life. The mindset and awareness of tech for pets continues to grow but the industry overall has lagged. There are definitely opportunities to make a huge difference.

Where and by whom is the most promising work in the field being done?

From my perspective, the innovation is not coming from the large animal health companies, they tend to wait until a new tech reaches some level of success and then either purchase it or duplicate it. The innovation comes from entrepreneurs both inside and outside of the animal health space.

What do you do to keep your batteries charged?

I can sometimes be at my desk, on the phone, and active on my computer for 12+ hours a day and seemingly look back and wonder what I have accomplished. So for me, I will escape to my secluded 100 acre tree farm that borders a state park and get behind the controls of my skid steer and work the land.

By that I mean work on trails or clearing some creeks and things that really have no monetary reward to them. It is mindless work but I love being in nature and at the end of a few hours of work, I can physically see the impact of my work. It also gives my mind time to shut out some of the clutter and really refocus on my most important goals.