SSR Mining Inc August 2019

EMBRACING DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION

02

SSR MINING: LEVERAGING TECHNOLOGY AMIDST TRANSFORMATION IN THE MINING SPACE WRITTEN BY

SEAN GALEA-PACE PRODUCED BY

JAMES BERRY

03

w w w.ssrmi ni n g . com

SSR MINING INC.

DAVID THOMAS, DIRECTOR OF IT AT SSR MINING, DISCUSSES HOW TECHNOLOGY HAS BECOME AN INFLUENTIAL COMPONENT TO OPERATIONS SINCE FIRST BEING EMBRACED IN 2013

A

s a firm that has undergone significant transformation over the past few years, SSR Mining knows first hand the impor-

tance of embracing the latest trends in order to stay ahead of competitors. With the increasing influence technology has had on industries the world over, 04

SSR Mining has come a long way since it first began to leverage new software and processes in 2013. David Thomas, Director of IT at SSR Mining, believes that, due to its smaller stature in comparison to bigger companies in the region, his firm has utilised this to its advantage. “The key benefit of how we operate is that we’re smaller. Leveraging infrastructure, such as cloud services that we don’t have to invest large capital in, makes us nimbler,” he says. “This means that a few years later, if we want to change and do something that’s slightly different because of new technology, we have the capabilities to do that. If you compare that to bigger companies, a lot of them have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in capital to build infrastructure, however, then they’re locked in. The landscape has changed for us smaller companies as we can get in

05

w w w.ssrmi ni n g . com

SSR MINING INC.

“THE KEY BENEFIT OF HOW WE OPERATE IS THAT WE’RE SMALLER” — David Thomas, Director of IT, SSR Mining

06

CLICK TO WATCH : ‘MARIGOLD MINE’ 07 there and do what we want and move

205,000 ounces of gold in 2018.

with the times – I think it means we’re

The Seabee Gold Operation produced

really lucky and in a really great place.”

over 95,000 ounces of gold in 2018,

Based in Vancouver, Canada, the

and Puna Operations achieved

mining firm focuses on the operation,

commercial production in December

acquisition, exploration and development

2018 and produces silver.

of precious metal resource properties

Thomas points to SSR Mining’s

in the Americans and oversees three

ability to combine a proactive and

producing mines: Marigold in Nevada;

reactive approach that differentiates

Seabee Gold Operation in Saskatch-

his company from its rivals. “We’re

ewan; and the 75% owned and

quite fortunate because we can be

operated Puna Operations joint

followers and leaders,” explains

venture in Jujuy Province, Argentina.

Thomas. “In 2013, we invested a little

Since its launch in 1989, the Marigold

bit of money into the cloud despite our

mine achieved production of over

size and the fact we were operating w w w.ssrmi ni n g . com

SSR MINING INC.

08

just one mine at the time. Our move

we saw back then was the fact that we

towards the cloud gave us the opportu-

could seize the opportunity to move

nity to move around our technology

into the cloud. When we acquired our

for various projects, such as predictive

second mine operation, Marigold, we

analytics or general artificial intelli-

were positioned to start moving that

gence (AI) and machine learning (ML)

operation’s IT into the cloud straight

type projects.” With mining often

away. During the acquisition, we began

considered as one of the slower

to transition from the previous owners’

industries to adopt new technology,

technology to the cloud. As Amazon

it wasn’t until 2013 when SSR Mining

and Azure introduced new things, we

really put its foot down towards

were able to take advantage of some

digitalisation. “Back then, we had no

of those new tools and features in our

tech. We had an email system and

other operation too.”

that’s pretty much it. But, one thing

Looking back to how operations

were previously conducted prior to new technology being introduced, Thomas acknowledges the challenges he’s faced over the years. “Previously, we didn’t have an Operational Excellence team like we do today,” he says.

“Making that connection with the business was a big challenge because we’ve got IT-orientated people and then at the other end of the scale are mining-focused people, too. For us, we had to bring those teams on the extreme ends together and talk about the challenges. For example, our Marigold mine has a dispatch system,

E XE CU T I VE PRO FI LE

David Thomas, Director of IT After six years of Civil Engineering and running a high-rise building computer design department in the mid 90s, Thomas graduated from the University of Technology in Sydney with an Engineering Degree and a Masters Degree in Engineering Management. After graduation he quickly moved into the Information Technology field in Melbourne Australia, working in the bill payment and consulting industries, before moving to Canada in 2005 where he led numerous IT departments and IT Consulting teams in mining, shipping, forestry and finance. With a deep background and education in both Engineering and Information Technology, Thomas provides both IT leadership and strategic IT transformation for SSR Mining Inc.

w w w.ssrmi ni n g . com

09

SSR MINING INC.

$400mn+ Approximate revenue

1946

Year founded

14,000+

10

Approximate number of employees

11

w w w.ssrmi ni n g . com

Manage, Solve, and Deliver I.T. We take pride in putting our customer service front and foremost by creating simple solutions for complex connections.

Discover your solution

similar to a taxi that tracks the destination of where you’re going. It’s important that we implement the right software that will enable us to improve. We had to have a much more conducive approach, and being able to do that gave us the ability to enhance our processes and automate emergency systems so that, if there’s a problem out on site, they can press a button and get support.”

Having partnered with tech giants such as Microsoft and Amazon Web Services (AWS), Thomas believes what

“ L EVERAGING INFRASTRUCTURE, SUCH AS CLOUD SERVICES THAT WE DON’T HAVE TO INVEST LARGE CAPITAL IN, MAKES US NIMBLER” — David Thomas, Director of IT, SSR Mining

makes a successful partnership is the 13

w w w.ssrmi ni n g . com

SSR MINING INC.

ability to understand what the other

and it offers us a much larger vendor

expects. “A good partnership will

footprint, too. With AWS, we would get

involve mutual communication at all

involved with the cyber types when

times and a joint ability to deliver

it comes to industrial.”

something that works well together.

14

With a determination to not rest

I know when it comes to some of these

on its previous successes, Thomas

smaller AWS or Azure partners, we

affirms SSR Mining isn’t at the finish

would choose a vendor that has the

line yet and he still considers it a small

skills and abilities internally to do the

and medium-sized enterprise (SME),

job, but that can also align with our

despite revenues of over $400mn in

nimbleness,” he explains. “A lot of our

2018. “In mining terms, our revenue is

infrastructure dovetails into Microsoft

relatively small. I think once you get

and AWS. Amazon can give us a nice

into the $2-4bn range of market

little angle in terms of IoT endpoints

capitalization, that’s when you can be

considered a big company. In terms

workforce is a key aspect for success,”

of market capitalization, we’re currently

he notes. “It’s about ensuring strategic

around $2bn so we’re not quite there

objectives are aligned with the

yet. I almost consider us like a shopping

operation base and being able to work

advert – we do more for less.” Looking

closely with the teams that we have

to the future, Thomas has clear ideas

recently developed in the last two to

about how his organisation can

three years, such as the Operational

continue to thrive in the mining space

Excellence team. We need to evolve

over the next few years and beyond.

as well as help with sustainability in the

“I’m sure the gold industry will drive

next couple of years.”

the success of the company through mergers and acquisitions; however, in terms of our operations, I believe our workforce and the safety of our 15

w w w.ssrmi ni n g . com

SSR Mining Inc. T +1 604 484 8219 www.ssrmining.com