Modern Mining November 2015

COVER STORY

unconditionally with the interests of its cli- ents. The use of a separate name also sharply differentiates Advisian from WorleyParsons, which is primarily seen in the marketplace as an EPCM and PMC contractor.” Advisian is not simply an amalgamation of the skills of Evans & Peck and the consulting services that were provided by WorleyParsons. It also incorporates the expertise of two other recent acquisitions of WorleyParsons, namely MTG, a Houston-based resource management consulting firm specialising in the chemicals and petrochemicals sectors, and INTECSEA, focused on offshore engineering. Last year WorleyParsons announced the restructuring of its business – as the culmination of its in-depth review of operations – into three business lines, namely Services, Major Projects and Improve. The establishment of Advisian adds a fourth business line to the group. All the business lines operate over three customer sec- tors, namely Hydrocarbons, Minerals, Metals & Chemicals, and Infrastructure. While Advisian will be targeting all these sectors in Africa, historically the local opera- tion has had an extremely strong presence in the minerals and metals industry. “The big- gest part of Advisian’s workload in Africa is still being derived from this sector,” says Rob McGill. “There’s no question, of course, that mining is in a severe downturn but we have a healthy workload of study and consulting work given the constrained environment. We have some significant sized current projects from a technical consulting point of view that we have been working on for a number of years. With these projects now well into execution, our ser- vices business is now taking the lead but we’re still doing some study and engineering work.” McGill mentions that Advisian is currently conducting several strategy and technical options analyses for customers in the gold and platinum sectors locally and in Zimbabwe using its StepWise methodology. “This is typi- cally applied before the pre-feasibility stage of a project,” he says. “In a four to six-week time-frame, it delivers a quantified range of sce- narios and options for the project, as well as a detailed roadmap to execution and assessment of the risks and opportunities. The key to this approach is to try to define and work towards certain project ‘metrics-for-success’ and to build a financial model from the start to test and quantify different options and scenarios. “This allows the project’s strategic options to be defined at an early stage and this is used to manage and govern all activities such as drill- ing and base-line data-gathering, so as to align

past it has generally been necessary for clients to change ‘horses’ during the project cycle. “Typically, they may employ a high level advi- sory consultancy to conceptualise a project and work out its broad parameters in terms of the business case, ownership structures, funding, contractual arrangements and the like. They would then have to change in mid-cycle to an engineering consultancy for engineering and delivery management, with inevitable disrup- tion to project continuity and turnaround time. With Advisian, this is no longer necessary. All the skills and expertise needed are available from a single source.” He adds that the establishment of Advisian as a standalone business line with its own dis- tinct identity emphasises its independence within the greater WorleyParsons group. “All the Advisian offices report to Dennis Finn, who was recruited from advisory firm PwC in 2014 to become global CEO of Advisian. This is an important point. Clients want the assurance that those who advise them are inde- pendent and – where they are part of a larger group – not simply pushing the interests and agenda of their parent organisation. Obviously, Advisian is a business line of WorleyParsons but the way it is structured gives it consider- able independence and allows it to align itself

WorleyParsons is the EPCM contractor for Shondoni, which is

essentially a new 9,2 Mt/a mine designed to replace the existing Middelbult operation of Sasol Mining.

The innovation that WorleyParsons – and

potentially Advisian – can bring to projects was well illustrated earlier this year when the lifting and positioning of the mine’s winder house took place. The lifting operation is seen here.

20  MODERN MINING  November 2015