Modern Mining January 2016

COVER STORY

some areas increasing – our share of a declin- ing market and we have a firm strategy in place to cope with the downturn.” Keenan, a Canadian, has only been with BME for a few months, having taken over the reins from his well-respected predecessor, Francois Hay, in September 2015. He has a BSc Geology from Laurentian University in Canada, an MBA from Edinburgh Business School in the UK, and has completed post-graduate pro- grammes at Insead (at its Singapore campus) and Harvard Business School in the US. His background has primarily been in either the explosives or petro-chemical industries, with his most recent appointments having been with Columbine Group in the US, Pacific Hydro in Australia and Orica in Chile. Although he has carried out assignments in Africa in the past, his present position with BME marks the first time he has been perma- nently positioned on the continent. Already he is impressed by what he has seen. “I’ve noticed a tendency on the part of South Africans to downplay their achievements and to assume that they’re followers rather than leaders in terms of technology,” he says. “I think they’re selling themselves short. Certainly if we look at the field of blasting and explosives, South Africa is at the forefront of developments and I’ve seen innovative and effective products and systems at BME which I’ve seen nowhere else in the world.” Outlining BME’s current strategies, he says a prime area of focus is customer engagement. “We’ve been speaking to our customers to gauge what they want from us and the mes- sage we’re getting is that they want to have a risk-free relationship with their explosives supplier,” he notes. “Many of them are either big companies, which have cut-back on their in-house technical capability as a result of downsizing and no longer have any significant expertise internally when it comes to blasting, while others are junior companies too small to have had any blasting expertise in the first place. Increasingly, they are looking to com- panies such as BME to fill the knowledge gap. We’ve always been strong on the technical sup- port we can offer but now we’re going to put an even greater emphasis on it. “Our blasting services group, headed by Tony Rorke, has a world reputation and we also have best-in-class tools that we can deploy to ensure that we achieve real down- stream benefits for our clients. There are a number of companies who can put explosives in the ground but customers want more than this and BME is primed to deliver.”

Keenan notes that another point to emerge from its customer-facing strategy is that there is a need for consistency of service. “We have taken up this particular challenge and we are determined to ensure that the BME experience for customers is the same, regardless of their size or their geographic location. They’re look- ing for a certain outcome and we must be up to the task of delivering that outcome, over and over again, whatever the challenges we our- selves face.” He adds that just as BME is looking outwards to its customer-base, so too is it engaging inter- nally with its own employees. “They’re one of our greatest assets with a vast collective expe- rience which we can tap into,” he explains. “So we’re asking them how we can be a better company. We want them to drive the company forward and this process has already started.” Staying on the theme of efficiency, Keenan points out that BME invested R200 million into automating its bulk emulsion plants and its detonator assembly facility in FY2015. “Many companies cut back on investment dur- ing a downturn but we see it as essential,” he maintains. “We need to be lean and trim and automation also drives improved quality.” Reviewing BME’s technology lineup, Keenan says the company is looking in par- ticular at increasing the market penetration of its AXXIS ® digital initiation system which – used in conjunction with BME’s industry- leading BlastMap™ software – is capable of achieving high accuracy blasts that far exceed anything that can be achieved using traditional non-electric detonator designs. “Many of our competitors have digital systems but I think AXXIS stands out due to its intuitive interface which makes for ease of operation. We find that once a mine has adopted the system, its per- sonnel – after training by BME – find it easy to use without the need for any ‘hand-holding’.

AXXIS offers two-way communication between the blasting box and detonators.

“We’ve been speaking to our customers to gauge what they want from us and the message we’re getting is that they want to have a risk-free relationship with their explosives supplier.”

January 2016  MODERN MINING  19