Sandvik enters into agreement with IBM

With the growth of onboard instrumentation and data gathering capabilities in heavy equipment, natural resource industries increasingly have the opportunity to employ advanced analytics and models to identify and resolve productivity issues and improve process optimisation and performance. The deployment of digital technologies is expected to generate a value of as much as US$100 billion to resource producing companies by 2035, according to McKinsey.

Sandvik and IBM will work together to improve productivity in mining and rock excavation companies globally. A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed with the intent to create market leading offerings in data driven productivity and predictive maintenance solutions. The two companies are already working with selected customers to pilot the concept and commercialise specific solutions. The first wave of work will be done on Loaders and Trucks, and will connect up to 15 units and integrate live data from multiple on- and off board systems to run the analytic algorithms.

The collaboration will involve the use of advanced analytics, remote monitoring and cognitive technologies to enable natural resource companies to combine equipment and application data from disparate resources and automatically analyse patterns in the data to improve productivity and performance.

This combination of information services, remote data collection and data analysis will enable increased effectiveness by increasing productivity, saving cost and reducing time wastage.

“Sandvik has been working with mining customers on mine automation and remote monitoring of machines for more than 20 years. Our OptiMine® and AutoMine® solutions are also important systems for data collection and consolidation that provide us with a great platform to get a flying start with IBM analytics solutions. So it is a natural step for us to collaborate with a company like IBM – experts in advanced analytics cognitive computing and modelling – to create even more value to our customers,” said Lars Engström, President, Sandvik Mining and Rock Technology. “This collaboration fits well with our service portfolio, which is based on traditional life-cycle, enhanced technical, and business services, all of which are aligned to improve safety, secure competences for mine operations and increase our customers’ productivity.”

“We look forward to taking our expertise in internet of things, advanced analytics and asset management and combining that with Sandvik’s years of experience in developing mining processes and machine technology to build a collaboration around innovation and delivery of smarter digital services offerings for natural resource companies around the globe,” said Anders Fredholm, VP Industrial Products Industry, IBM Europe.

Read the article online at: https://www.worldcement.com/product-news/03032017/sandvik-enters-into-agreement-with-ibm/