Ambatovy Joint Venture – one of the largest lateritic nickel mining operations in the world (a large-tonnage, long-life nickel and cobalt mining enterprise) – has chosen Oniqua to help standardise and optimise its inventory across its Madagascar operations. With a nameplate capacity of 60,000 t of refined nickel, Ambatovy is positioned as one of the world’s biggest nickel mines from lateritic sources.

“This implementation is absolutely key to us achieving our 2016 goals,” commented Simon Blamires, Ambatovy SCM Director. “We have been delighted to work closely with Oniqua and our IT Group on this project, delivering a working inventory system in record time. This will allow Ambatovy to reduce overall investment in working capital, whilst also allowing us to provide the spare parts and consumables necessary to fully support business operations.”

Oniqua Analytics Solution (OAS) says it “is the world’s most powerful and comprehensive analytics solution for MRO optimisation. Leveraging advanced analytics, OAS performs end-to-end analyses across customers’ MRO activities; then OAS provides proactive, detailed prescriptive recommendations for smarter decision making, enhanced asset performance and greater operational efficiency. The OAS architecture is highly scalable, supporting small single installs to large global enterprise clients.”

“Ambatovy identified the business need to reduce operating costs by standardising descriptions for moving spares and optimizing MRO inventory levels,” said Lindsay Clarke, Vice President Strategic Accounts, Oniqua Intelligent MRO. “Oniqua’s proven MRO inventory optimisation solution, combined with Oniqua Standards Dictionary (OSD), will provide the capabilities to enable reductions in working capital requirements and assist cost avoidance against future demand through the implementation of standardised, automated inventory optimisation processes.”

Ambatovy will leverage the OSD to standardise its materials catalogue and eliminate potential purchase of duplicate items. Cleansing the material catalogue also assists with improvements in contract management, purchasing and inventory optimisation.