Modern Mining January 2017

COVER STORY

BME grows its overseas footprint

Explosives supplier BME, part of the plus R16 billion-a-year, JSE-listed Omnia Group, is continuing to operate profitably despite tough conditions in the mining sector. While Africa remains the focus for BME, it is expanding steadily into overseas markets, the latest being Colombia in South America. BME’s MD, Joseph Keenan, says the globalisation of BME’s activities is just one of a range of initiatives designed to allow BME to continue on the uninterrupted growth path – in terms of revenues – it has experienced in recent years.

K eenan, a Canadian who took over at BME in September 2015, is em- phatic that the company needs to broaden its geographic base. “BME was originally established

in South Africa more than 30 years ago and has since steadily expanded into Africa – to the point where we’re now a major player across the continent, with a particularly strong pres- ence in the SADC region and West Africa,” he says. “In respect of overseas markets, we already Joseph Keenan, Managing Director of BME.

BME is pioneering the use of technologies such as un- manned aerial vehicles, GPS and 3D photogrammetry to improve blast design.

have a presence in some regions – including a joint venture in Australia – but we will now fo- cus on growing this footprint even further.” He adds that BME will initially focus on marketing its AXXIS ® electronic detonator system in overseas markets. “This provides an entry point for us. The ultimate goal, however, will be to leverage off the sale and support of electronic detonators to become a full service provider, just as we are here in Africa. Already we are supplying emulsion explosives to the Indonesian coal mining industry and, based on this experience, it is very clear that we can operate very successfully as a bulk explosives supplier in overseas markets.” A few months ago BME attempted to expand into Canada by purchasing Nordex Explosives. “Our bid was not successful but the exercise has proven very valuable inasmuch as we’ve now identified other potential partners,” notes Keenan. “We like the Canadian market. It’s healthy and the mining culture and technolo- gies are similar to South Africa, so we believe it holds excellent potential for us.” As regards Colombia, Keenan says BME now has a contract in place with a parastatal which supplies the country’s mines. “Colombia is one of the biggest markets in the world for electronic detonators. We went through an evaluation process with the parastatal and major mining operations in respect of our AXXIS system and they were impressed by its performance. They

18  MODERN MINING  January 2017