DESTINATION DIGITAL

AUSTRALIAN MINING SAT DOWN WITH ACCENTURE TO LEARN HOW COMPANIES CAN SUCCESSFULLY NAVIGATE AN EVOLVING DIGITAL LANDSCAPE.

Accenture is a global professional services company with expertise in a range of areas like consulting and technology. As the company's global mining lead, Marco Ribas has seen how digitalisation can transform a resources operation.

But the area is broad, so knowing where to begin can be a challenge.

Leverage and save

In its 2023 forecast, global intelligence and data provider International Data Corporation predicted that by the end of 2024, 50 per cent of the world's top mining companies will utilise cloud-based operational planning and simulation tools.

These kinds of enterprise resource planning (ERP) technologies help organisations manage their day-today in applications such as finance, procurement, and transactional human resources.

ERP systems also help strengthen a business through decision support, greater analytics and improved optimisation capabilities.

Ribas said these technologies are well-advanced, so rather than trying to build new systems, mining companies would benefit from leveraging existing products.

"There is a lot of maturity around business processes," Ribas said. "If you look at procurement for example, the mining industry can benefit from a wealth of professionals on the service side who understand how to procure materials and platforms that are very advanced.

"Mining organisations should try to reap the benefits of the learnings of others in this area without trying to reinvent the wheel."

Ribas said that while ERP technologies are generally not considered a key source of differentiation for mining companies, when implemented at scale they can result in a significant uplift in productivity across the entire business, which helps them maintain a competitive advantage.