Tag Archives: Rajkumar Mathiravedu

Orica’s Champ Navigator2 to offer high-density true vertical continuous survey measurement

Mineral exploration, , , ,

Orica has announced the release of its latest Champ Navigator2™ technology, to enable operators to measure with greater accuracy in more orientations.

Champ Navigator2 is the latest iteration of Axis Mining Technology portfolio of engineering complex surveying measurements into driller operable hardware.

Orica’s purpose is to sustainably mobilise the earth’s resources, and precise knowledge of resource location is essential data that supports each phase of the value chain from exploration to processing. The accurate identification and orientation of every borehole serves as pivotal information in orebody characterisation and significantly influences critical operational processes such as mine planning, grade control, dilution management and blending.

Developed by Orica Digital Solutions in Tewkesbury, England, the Axis team have a track record of delivering innovative and integrated measurement solutions, Orica says. With a design ethos that goes beyond the measurement hardware to incorporate workflows to maximise driller productivity, the Champ Navigator2 is likely to be another product that drillers choose to use, delivering the survey quality that geologists demand, the company claims. The combination of this hardware with complementary software is expected to significantly accelerate and enhance mining workflows.

Champ Navigator2 enhances the standard Champ Navigator by offering high-density true vertical continuous survey measurement while significantly improving North-Seek azimuth accuracy and repeatability across all measurement modes. Adding high-speed, high-density vertical continuous surveying that does not rely on data interpolation leads to higher quality surveys and reduced survey times, improving both drilling productivity and survey quality, according to Orica. This improvement not only enhances productivity but also minimises standby costs for customers.

Orica Digital Solutions Vice President, Rajkumar Mathiravedu, said: “Orica Digital Solutions is continually expanding our offerings to solve more of our customers’ challenges, and Axis is at the forefront of this in the Orebody Intelligence space. Our global team of hardware and software engineers build the best-in-class user experience not just for the initial users of the tools or recipients of the data, but for any divisions who need the data for downstream operations.”

High-speed continuous survey capability is flexible to all drilling environments, underground or surface. Orica added: “Confidence begins at the collar with a measured North Seek azimuth and extends to the intuitive driller-friendly operating interface that supports effective survey execution.”

Mathiravedu concluded: “Orica has been shaping the future of mining for 150 years, and our digital solutions such as the Champ Navigator2 are a testament to our ongoing commitment to innovation, safety and delivering value for our customers.”

Orica, Caterpillar to provide customers with high-fidelity rock property information

Explosives and blasting, IoT, Mining equipment, Mining services, Sustainable mining, , , , , , , ,

Orica and Caterpillar Inc have confirmed they are teaming up to improve real-time data exchange and integrate workflows across the mining value chain.

The collaboration is aimed at providing customers with intelligence to improve decision making and optimise their entire operations, with the announcement following a mention of this tie-up in Orica’s most recent FY2023 financial year results webcast.

The mining industry has started to unlock the potential of combining data, sensors and intelligence to optimise workflows for real-time decision making and value chain optimisation, the companies said. Digitally integrated workflows enable customers to achieve a step change in safety, productivity, recovery and sustainability outcomes for their operations.

“To realise the full potential across the entire value chain, technology domain leaders, customers and academia need to increase collaboration in an open ecosystem to develop integrated, end-to-end operational workflows which link orebody intelligence, drilling and blasting, material characterisation and processing,” they said.

Recognising this, Orica and Caterpillar have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to explore opportunities to integrate key elements of their respective domains. The initial focus will be on the potential integration between Orica’s Rhino™, BlastIQ™, and FRAGTrack™ technologies with Cat® MineStar™ Terrain.

The goal of this integrated workflow is to provide customers with high-fidelity rock property information enabling significant improvements to on-bench safety, drilling and blasting program accuracy and productivity, along with higher quality blast outcomes that generate enhanced mill performance.

In the future, the two companies intend to extend their collaboration to optimisation of the entire value chain, from mine to mill. This approach aligns with both organisations’ ambitions to create sustainable solutions and services that will build the momentum for more intelligent and solution-driven mining ecosystems.

Sean McGinnis, Vice President of Technology & Global Sales Support, Caterpillar, said: “Our customers are looking for every opportunity to optimise the productivity and safety of their mining and processing operations. By combining and leveraging the insights unlocked by Orica and Caterpillar’s technologies, we will be able to provide customers greater access and visibility to the data and information they need to make, better real-time business decisions.”

Rajkumar Mathiravedu, Vice President of Orica Digital Solutions, said: “The mining industry requires greater collaboration amongst its leading technology players to build connected workflows across different domains to address the current issue of value-leakage arising from traditional and disconnected silos. Collaborative end-to-end ecosystems are critical to harnessing the full potential of advances in sensors, data processing and intelligence to enable the development of safer, more sustainable, and productive methods of resource recovery.

“Orica Digital Solutions is excited to be working with Caterpillar across a range of domains as we aim to better connect the digital and physical worlds to give our customers more timely and actionable insights across their value chains.”

Orica releases BlastIQ Underground to improve blasting performance

Explosives and blasting, Mining services, Mining software, Sustainable mining, , , ,

Orica has announced the release of its latest BlastIQ™ Underground technology, which, it says, improves underground blasting performance with integrated digital solutions.

Developed by Orica Digital Solutions, BlastIQ Underground provides quality control and improved drill and blast productivity for superior blast outcomes, the company says. Enabling underground operations to efficiently manage their blasting process, from planning to post-blast analysis, with user-friendly reporting, analytics, and information management.

The suite of technologies improves blast productivity with the digital communication of blast designs, including the re-application of charging designs in response to hole locations. The digital collection and management of drilling data empower engineers to identify opportunities for continuous improvement of drilling and charging operations, the company says.

Orica Vice President Digital Solutions, Rajkumar Mathiravedu, said: “Orica is continually growing its digital offerings for customers to align with the swift digital transformation across the industry.

“Our software ensures that every blast is executed precisely, and the desired outcomes are achieved. This level of accuracy translates into significant cost savings and improved resource utilisation for our customers. To better cater to our customers, we are amassing a digital technology portfolio that complements our core blasting technologies such as 4D Underground, WebGen and Avatel.”

BlastIQ Underground enables customers to streamline their workflows, reduce operational costs and gain a competitive edge in the market, according to Orica.

Mathiravedu concluded: “We are shaping the future of underground mining and our digital solutions are a testament to our ongoing commitment to innovation, safety, productivity and sustainability.”

BlastIQ Underground can also help reduce the environmental footprint of mining operations, according to Orica. The software’s precision drilling and blasting capabilities minimises ground vibrations, air overpressure and environmental impact of blasting activities.

Orica looks to enhance blast design value generation with OREPro 3D Predict

Explosives and blasting, Mineral processing, Mining equipment, Mining services, , , ,

Orica has announced the release of its latest OREPro™ 3D Predict modelling software that, it says, predicts blast movement in near real time and optimises grade control value.

Over 30 years of research and development (R&D) coupled with significant cloud-based computing power have led to the creation of OREPro 3D Predict software, which is at its heart a blast movement simulator and grade control polygon optimiser. The solution leverages the power of Orica’s original OREPro 3D modelling expertise with an addition of the enhanced predictive SmartVector™ technology, it said.

The company explained: “No longer are blast designers relying on simple rules of thumb or luck to optimise blasting for grade control; OREPro 3D Predict opens the door to iterative designs and the quantification of value in each blast design.”

Using readily available mine data as inputs, including blast designs and in-situ block models, physics-based algorithms predict movement dynamics throughout the entire blast volume to create a “swelled post-blast grade control block model”. The polygon optimisation tools will then suggest delineations that can help achieve the highest value possible, according to Orica.

Orica Vice President Digital Solutions, Rajkumar Mathiravedu, said: “Orica’s purpose is to mobilise the earth’s resources sustainably and we aim to achieve this by integrating end-to-end workflows across the mining value chain, and it all starts with a better understanding of the orebody and the way in which it moves during extraction.

“With OREPro 3D Predict, our customers can now predict blast results, allowing blast designers to rapidly create blasts that increase value in near real time instead of waiting until the blast is excavated to understand the impacts.”

Understanding where the rock mass has moved during the blast is critical to separating ore and waste effectively and creating downstream efficiencies in the mining process. OREPro 3D Predict takes this a step further by simulating post-blast topography when it cannot be surveyed safely, handling complex boundary conditions with ease and providing enhanced transparency by animating the entire predicted movement, Orica said.

OREPro 3D Predict further enhances Orica’s Digital Solutions offerings by allowing customers to plan effectively and track material through complex interactions with the surrounding geology. This product is a cornerstone of iterative optimisation and complements the reactive software OREPro 3D, creating value for its customers through a complete grade control workflow offering, the company added.

Orica continues to expand digital capabilities with help of Microsoft Azure

Comminution of minerals, Explosives and blasting, IoT, Mineral processing, Mining services, Mining software, , , , , ,

Leading blasting company Orica says it is rapidly expanding its digital capability, creating data rich and AI-infused tools that enable step-change improvements in customers’ productivity, safety and sustainability.

Over the last four years, Orica has grown its digital team fivefold, and from a standing start it now has more than 200 customers for its digital solutions – building a whole new offering and revenue stream for the company, it said.

It has now enlisted the help of Microsoft’s Azure platform as the strategic cloud foundation for its emerging digital portfolio. Azure’s performance, reliability, scalability and security provide trusted foundations for innovation while access to Azure IoT, a growing portfolio of Azure cognitive services and an extensive library of AI tools helps accelerate Orica’s digital innovation, according to Rajkumar Mathiravedu, Vice President of Digital Solutions for Orica.

Mathiravedu is also keen on the industry cross-pollination opportunities that the Azure ecosystem affords. He noted: “We are seeing Azure being deployed in lot of oil and gas applications and some of those can easily be applied in mining.”

Meanwhile he’s keeping a close eye on how emerging Azure capabilities, such as Azure Space which allows satellite information to be made easily accessible, could further expand Orica’s innovation horizons.

The company is already working on open digital platforms that integrate Orica expertise, customers’ own data with machine learning to create intelligent production workflows that, in real time, reveal to mining engineers what they are working with at a particular site and provide live design recommendations.

“Whether it is hard, medium, soft, and how the rock changes and where the most valuable ore is located,” Mathiravedu said. “So what it really means is now you can actually optimise the right explosives energy specific to the desired outcomes.

“This has a huge impact from a sustainability perspective. By using the right energy to break the rocks, we’re optimising the chemical energy. We are materially reducing the water and electricity, which is used for grinding and processing later, while readily managing environmental factors such dust and vibrations.”

This solution is now in production with an iron ore miner based in Australia, he added.

Orica’s cloud based digital platforms are designed to allow information to be shared openly across mining ecosystems – from geological exploration, through blasting, extraction and processing – integrating sensor and IoT data with AI-infused analytics to provide mining customers with the insights which will allow them to go “deeper, steeper and cheaper”, Mathiravedu said.

Leveraging the cloud, IoT, edge-processing and machine learning algorithms, Orica focuses on delivering real-time data-driven insights to help customers optimise energy use, drill patterns and maximise efficiencies both on the mine site and throughout the downstream value chain.

Srikant Kadambi, Energy Lead, Microsoft Asia, said: “Orica has unparalleled domain expertise and global industry knowledge. Combining that with Microsoft Azure capabilities and the ability of our teams and ecosystems to deploy these technologies at production scale allows us to work together to create literally ground-breaking – pun intended – solutions for the whole mining value chain. We bring to the table our whole Azure ecosystem, access to libraries of AI tools developed for different industries, and skills and expertise that we can share with Orica as it continues to grow its digital capability.”

To reinforce this digital focus, Orica has opened a Digital Immersion Centre in Brisbane – a specialised facility where it can, the company says, work with development partners, including Microsoft, and customers to promote innovation, spur collaboration and also establish an Orica data and analytics centre of excellence.

This centre of excellence brings together data science, artificial intelligence, modern cloud computing and Orica’s 140 plus years of domain expertise. It will also act as an incubator for any Orica digital businesses.

Mathiravedu said the digital team is building solutions to support existing Orica customers, as well as new customers from right across the sector’s value chain. Open by design, these platforms are tailored for a range of applications focused around efficiency, productivity and safety as well as to help support customers achieve their own sustainability targets.

“We do not want to be constrained only to existing Orica customers,” he said. “We want to be available to the entire mining value chain.”

Orica looks to further improve blast outcomes with latest OREPro 3D release

Explosives and blasting, Mining services, Mining software, , , , , , , , , ,

Orica has released its latest OREPro™ 3D blast movement modelling software for, it says, maximum ore recovery, productivity and throughput.

Developed in partnership with major mining companies, OREPro 3D, is a software application that accurately models blast movement, enabling situational awareness and improved grade control for customers globally, Orica said.

It uses readily available mine data as inputs, including blast designs, in-situ block models and post-blast muck pile surveys. Algorithms then replicate movement dynamics throughout the entire blast volume and calculate SmartVectors™ that accurately transform the in-situ grade control into a swelled post-blast grade control model, the company explained.

Orica Chief Technology Officer, Angus Melbourne, said: “Orica has a vision of becoming an integrated ore extraction mining services company and we are rapidly building a portfolio of digital technologies to augment our core explosives technologies and solutions and better serve customers. This technology is a critical enabler to us building an open, secure and connected digital ecosystem that will allow our customers to accurately model and continually improve blast outcomes and the impact on their downstream operations.”

Understanding where the rock mass has moved, post-blast, is critical to separating ore and waste effectively and creating downstream efficiencies in the mining process, and this has the potential to unlock significant value for customers.

Orica Vice President Digital Solutions, Rajkumar Mathiravedu, said: “We’re excited about the OREPro 3D technology as it complements and will soon integrate with our existing suite of market-leading digital blast design, execution and measurement solutions, including SHOTPlus, BlastIQ, FRAGTrack and ORETrack. The integration of these solutions will offer customer’s unrivalled digital workflow solutions from orebody knowledge through to mineral processing.”

OREPro 3D, which is used by many tier-one miners around the world today, Orica says, will continue to be offered as a standalone blast movement solution or optionally integrated with other Orica products and services to deliver greater insights and optimisation opportunities to customers.

Orica to open access to the Integrated Extraction Simulator with JKTech deal

Comminution of minerals, IoT, Mineral processing, Mining services, Mining software, Power supply for mines, Sustainable mining, Water management, , , , , ,

Orica says it has signed a landmark software licence agreement with JKTech Pty Ltd that will give it access to models developed by the Julius Kruttschnitt Mineral Research Centre (JKMRC) that are used in comminution and flotation simulation.

The agreement will open industry access to the Integrated Extraction Simulator (IES) with JKMRC models – by combining widely applied industry models into one integrated and collaborative cloud-hosted platform that simulates and optimises every step in the mining value chain, the company said.

At the back end of last year, Orica was selected as the commercialisation partner for the Cooperative Research Centre for Optimising Resource Extraction’s (CRC ORE) IES, a cloud-based software platform designed to reduce the use of energy and water in mining through the application of simulation, optimisation and machine learning.

IES has been developed from the combined research of CRC ORE, The JKMRC and AMIRA, and, to this point, has been available free to CRC ORE 1 Participants (term 2010-2015) and CRC ORE 2 Participants (term 2015-2021) when used in research projects and site-based implementations.

Integrating and optimising drilling and blasting, crushing, grinding and flotation, IES provides mine managers with a cloud-based decision support platform that enables production departments to coordinate and optimise system value across all operational metrics.

“Mining operations have to process multiple material types simultaneously in their operations – so their simulator platform should be able to as well,” CRC ORE says. “IES has been designed from the ground up as a platform for multi-component modelling and the new generation equipment models are responding to the challenge. Trusted models from years of research have been upgraded to ‘multi-component’ capability and IES offers model developer’s sophisticated tools to facilitate multi-component processing.”

Orica Vice President Digital Solutions, Rajkumar Mathiravedu, said: “This partnership will allow us to continue to underpin advances in simulation and industry value creation, from orebody knowledge through to the final product.”

Orica to take CRC ORE’s IES cloud-based simulation technology global

Automation, Environmental, IoT, Mineral processing, Mining mergers and acquisitions, Mining services, Mining software, Sustainable mining, Water management, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Orica has been selected as the commercialisation partner for the Cooperative Research Centre for Optimising Resource Extraction’s (CRC ORE) Integrated Extraction Simulator, a cloud-based software platform designed to reduce the use of energy and water in mining through the application of simulation, optimisation and machine learning.

The award followed a competitive selection process, with the global mining explosives and services giant set to take the reins of the platform’s growth strategy from July 2021, with plans for global expansion of the technology.

Orica’s interest was initially driven by IES’s introduction of blast simulation into the mineral processing value chain, CRC ORE said. While mine operators can use controlled blasting techniques as an effective augmentation of the rock breakage process, Orica also saw the wider application of IES as an obvious fit with its expanding digital solutions offer across the whole mining value chain.

“By harnessing the virtually limitless scalability available through cloud computing services, mining companies can now use IES to configure multiple design options for a mineral processing plant,” CRC ORE said. “IES then tasks each design and simulates its performance for every day of operation over the life of a mine. This high-resolution simulation of each design leaves no stone unturned in the pursuit of optimal mineral processing.”

Orica intends to expand this capability into a global solution for mining companies, enabling them to design their mineral processing using IES, and then leverage IES’s capability every day to drive continual operational improvements.

CRC ORE Chief Executive Officer, Dr Ben Adair, said having a company the calibre of Orica as commercialisation partner is testament to the enormous opportunity and benefits that the simulator provides to the mining industry.

“We have worked with our Participants over many years to refine our simulation platform,” Dr Adair said. “As a foundation Participant in CRC ORE, Orica shares our commitment to optimising resource extraction and our passion for the continued development of the simulator.

“The scale offered by Orica’s global reach, in addition to its sustained investment in research and development and unwavering focus on innovation, makes it the ideal custodian of IES.”

Orica has been evolving towards its vision of an integrated ore extraction mining services company, with this vision including investing in digital solutions where continuous innovation and open integration with other industry systems across the mining value chain are key to the delivery of whole of mine optimisation for customers, CRC ORE said.

Orica Chief Commercial and Technology Officer, Angus Melbourne, said Orica is primed to take the simulator global and continually evolve the technology to meet the ever changing needs of the industry.

“This is a great example of industry collaboration developing solutions to industry level problems, and we are extremely proud to be part of it,” he said. “It is a fantastic opportunity to continue Orica’s 11-year relationship with CRC ORE and further expand our digital solutions offering by combining our blasting domain expertise with this leading simulation technology to customers and beyond worldwide.”

Orica Vice President Digital Solutions, Rajkumar Mathiravedu, said: “From a technology perspective, we see enormous synergies with our existing blasting and measurement solutions, including BlastIQ, FRAGTrack and ORETrack. We are also excited to integrate our automated, data science enabled blast design technology and solutions with IES, offering end-to-end digitised workflow solutions from orebody knowledge through to mineral processing in an open, secure, and connected platform.”

CRC ORE’s team of developers and consultant engineers will integrate into Orica from July 2021 and will continue to be led by CRC ORE’s current General Manager for the simulator, Nick Beaton.

Beaton said: “IES is now at the right point in its development to become commercially sustainable while continuing to develop new capabilities. It will be thrilling to continue this with Orica.

“We have demonstrated that the simulator can improve the value of major mine sites by some 5-6; this is significant for the mines using the simulator and for the whole industry.

“Optimisation of processing operations by use of IES will also enable step-change reductions in power and water consumption, while greatly improving recoveries of marginal ores, all contributing to the future sustainability of mining operations.”

The transition of the IES business to Orica will take place in the middle of 2021 when CRC ORE’s term comes to an end. In the meantime, CRC ORE and Orica, together with industry partners, will continue developing innovations to drive continual improvements throughout the mining industry. Continuing this innovation, Orica looks forward to IES participation in the next iteration of the Amira P9 project.

Orica’s FRAGTrack recognised for outstanding design and innovation at Good Design Awards

IoT, Mining equipment, Mining services, Mining software, , , , , , , , , ,

FRAGTrack™, Orica’s innovative fragmentation measurement technology, has received a prestigious Good Design Award accolade in the Engineering Design category in recognition for outstanding design and innovation.

The award was recieved by Orica and design partners, Design Anthology, Newie Ventures and Your Engineer Mechanical Design, who supported the development of the technology. FRAGTrack captures real-time fragmentation measurement data for optimising drill and blast operations and improves downstream efficiencies in the mining process, Orica says.

The annual Good Design Awards is Australia’s oldest and most prestigious international awards for design and innovation with a history dating back to 1958.

“The awards celebrate the best new products and services on the Australian market, excellence in architectural design, engineering, fashion, digital and communication design, design strategy, social impact design and young designers,” the company said.

The Good Design Awards Jury praised FRAGTrack, commenting: “An innovative design that has the potential to improve commercial and safety outcomes in the mining and extractive industries that use drill and blast techniques. An excellent piece of engineering design using scanning and multi-camera technologies with extensive software engineering in a highly innovative application.

“The robustness of the design and its adaptability are also commended. This is a clever solution to the tedious problem of quantifying fragmentation after blasting. It ruggedises cameras and processors to survive in harsh mining and environmental conditions. Overall, a solid piece of industrial and engineering design that deserves to be recognised and celebrated.”

In accepting the award, Orica’s Vice President of Digital Solutions, Rajkumar Mathiravedu, acknowledged: “We’ve been able to develop this unique digital solution by combining more than 20 years of customer input, internal expertise and collaborations with market-leading specialists Design Anthology, Newie Ventures and Your Engineer Mechanical Design to make it a reality. This award is recognition of the extraordinary people and partners behind this innovative and value delivering technology.

“Throughout the development process we’ve taken the time to listen to the needs of our customers, and then work with them to evolve the design and engineering to suit harsh mining conditions, delivering real impact and outcomes for them – it’s what makes this such a unique and impactful innovation, especially as our customers strive for greater competitive advantage in these challenging times.”

More than 55 Good Design Awards Jurors evaluated each entry according to a strict set of design criteria which covers ‘good design’, ‘design innovation’ and ‘design impact’, Orica says. Projects recognised with a Good Design Award must demonstrate excellence in good design and convince the Jury they are worthy of recognition at this level.

Dr Brandon Gien, CEO of Good Design Australia, said: “Receiving a Good Design Award is a significant achievement given the very high calibre and record number of entries received in 2020.”

Following last month’s ‘Australia’s Most Innovative Manufacturing Company’ and ‘Best Industrial IIoT Application’ awards, this latest recognition further cements FRAGTrack as a pioneer product in mining innovation, Orica said. “It is one of the key value-adding technologies that is reinforcing Orica’s differentiated position in the marketplace,” it added.

Orica on the right Track with new digital blasting solutions

Automation, Comminution of minerals, Explosives and blasting, IoT, Mining consumables, Mining safety, Mining services, Mining software, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Orica’s suite of rock movement, blast fragmentation and digital blast optimisation solutions have been gaining traction of late, with miners across the globe employing or trialling the products as they look to improve mine site performance.

Ahead of the annual Explosives and Blasting feature (to be published in the International Mining July/August 2020 issue), IM spoke with Rajkumar Mathiravedu, Vice President of Digital Solutions at Orica, to get an update on progress with the company’s digital solutions.

Back in Orica’s 2019 full-year results, Orica mentioned it had secured its first customers in Latin America for its ORETrack™ solution, which provides RFID-based tracking of rock movement from blasting operations.

Mathiravedu said these first adopters were recognising the value delivered by the technology, with ORETrack working well in the initial applications.

“We are also continuing to co-develop and expand our ORETrack technology in collaboration with customers in Latin America, with additional customers adopting the ore tracking capability,” he said.

“Further trials are also planned for the near future, including locations in Australia and North America.”

The number of customers taking up Orica’s FRAGTrack™ solution, which provides blast fragmentation data with auto-analysis capability, meanwhile, has been growing in the face of COVID-19 travel restrictions.

Orica carried out its first fully remote installation of FRAGTrack during lockdown in Australia, with a second in Finland and a third one completed in North America recently.

Mathiravedu said a key focus in developing the solution, which captures real-time fragmentation measurement data for downstream unit productivity improvement and tracking of operational performance, was ensuring it was “a plug and play solution” that could be installed and supported remotely.

“We developed rigorous training material and installation instructions and married these with real-time augmented reality capability to remotely guide and support our customers through the implementation,” he said.

“We have found this particularly advantageous during the COVID-19 restrictions, but also this allows our customers to manage the implementation timing to suit their operations.”

An example of this could be the desire for a customer to install FRAGTrack when the shovels are down for maintenance, without having to wait for an Orica specialist to come to the site and install the system.

Reflecting on the recent remote installation achievements, Mathiravedu said: “This proves we have a successful remote release model that customers are valuing during these unprecedented times.”

BlastIQ workflow integration

Fifteen months after the release of its next generation BlastIQ, Orica has now surpassed the 60-site implementation mark of its digital blast optimisation platform.

Mathiravedu said BlastIQ and the company’s ever-growing digital capabilities are designed to improve blast outcomes by integrating insights from digitally connected technologies at every stage of the drill and blast process to drive continuous improvements for its customers.

“Focusing on the needs of our surface mining customers, we have been able to deliver the benefits of cloud-based technology, providing convenience and flexibility for customers to access their blasting data online anywhere, anytime from any device,” he said.

“Customers are also benefitting significantly from digitising their blasting workflows, delivering efficiencies and improved quality control across their blasting operations, resulting in greater visibility of blast inputs and outputs in real time while benefiting from better blast outcomes.”

As an open, secure, and connected digital platform, BlastIQ’s blast-related data is being integrated directly into customers’ mining value chain and remote operation centres via secure cloud-based APIs, Mathiravedu said.

“This is enabling customers to drive better mine-level decisions based on data integrations between our platform and theirs, creating a stronger bond between planning, drilling, blasting, load and haul and processing operations at the site,” he said.

BlastIQ is an inter-operable platform and is being delivered as a Software as a Service product to customers, meaning they receive new functionality, value and features as soon as they are developed, according to Mathiravedu.

“Enhancements are scheduled and developed based on direct feedback and submissions from our customers all around the world to ensure the product evolves to meet the discrete needs of their operations,” he said.

Outside of BlastIQ specifically, Orica has started to deliver digital optimisation services to its customers, according to Mathiravedu.

“State-of-the-art” digital products and advanced data science and analytics, combined with blasting technical know-how and market-leading blasting technologies, enables customers to cover whole of value chain solutions, enabled by blasting, Mathiravedu said.

“Also, using a series of industry 4.0 smart Internet of Things sensors and Edge computing to replace inefficient manual processes, measurement data can be used in real time to improve future mining outcomes based on data science, analytics and machine-learning algorithms to drive continuous improvement of the entire mining value chain.”