Video, collaboration and ICT services from Spark Digital help OceanaGold drive efficiencies, increase production and deliver record revenues.

Transcription

1 Video, collaboration and ICT services from Spark Digital help OceanaGold drive efficiencies, increase production and deliver record revenues.

2 About OceanaGold 800 people spanning New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the Phillippines $385million annual revenue. OceanaGold mines cutting-edge communications. OceanaGold is a significant Asia-Pacific gold producer, with operating, development and exploration assets in New Zealand and the Philippines was a pivotal year for the company, with solid production and high gold prices producing record revenues and cash flows. Following the successful commissioning of its Philippine Didipio mine in December 2012, OceanaGold predicts that production across the business will increase by 30 percent in 2013, with costs falling by a similar percentage. Didipio is a game changer for the company an asset with great economics and a long reserve life which will underpin the company for years to come. OceanaGold s IT Manager, Jeff Nam, explains that ICT plays an important role in helping the company achieve its goals of an increased reserve and resource base, expanded production and lower costs. An important part of my role is to support the business to implement performance excellence programmes that drive efficiencies and increase profit margins from our operations, says Jeff. JEFF NAM, Spark Digital has supported our growth with a quality and highly reliable service that gives us assurance in our service availability and allows us to confidently plan for the future. Powerful tools Listed on the Toronto, Australian and New Zealand stock exchanges, OceanaGold s assets include New Zealand s largest gold mining operation at Macraes goldfield in Otago, spanning the Macraes Open Pit and Frasers Underground mines. It also operates the Reefton Open Pit mine on the west coast of the South Island. The company consistently met deadlines throughout Didipio s construction and achieved a major milestone in January 2013 when the first truckloads of copper-gold concentrate were delivered to the local port. Mining is a complex and labour-intensive business, says Jeff. We extract around one gram of gold per tonne of ore. That means that the monitoring and management of our drill rigs, dump trucks and diggers is a key area of focus for delivering greater efficiencies and increased output.

3 OceanaGold uses Caterpillar s Vital Information Management System (VIMS) to provide operators, service personnel and managers information on a wide range of vital machine functions. Numerous sensors are integrated into the vehicle design. If VIMS detects an impeding or abnormal condition in any of the machine s systems, it will alert the operator and instruct them to take appropriate action, whether it s modifying machine operation, notifying the shop of needed maintenance or performing a safe shutdown of the machine, Jeff explains. VIMS also records the various elements of the truck cycle, including load time, travel loaded, dump time and travel empty, along with delay times. This information is used for analysis and better decision-making to create a more efficient operation and lower the cost per tonne. Cutting-edge communications With 800 people working at remote sites spanning New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the Philippines, the right communication tools are critical for OceanaGold s people to collaborate on complex projects. Spark Digital is a long-standing partner of OceanaGold, providing voice, data, internet, procurement and data centre hosting services for over ten years. We ve experienced fast growth over the past decade, growing from 100 to 800 people and annual revenues now totaling $385 million, says Jeff. Spark Digital has supported our growth with a quality and highly reliable service that gives us assurance in our service availability and allows us to confidently plan for the future. One recent initiative has been the deployment of Microsoft Lync 2010 across New Zealand and Australia. Lync gives us presence capabilities that allow our people to connect at a deeper level and collaborate more effectively. Whether our people are travelling or in the office, Lync makes it easy to get in touch with everyone. In 2011, it invested in video conferencing technology, with Spark Digital deploying Polycom units at OceanaGold s New Zealand, Australian and Philippines sites, providing its staff the ability to connect anytime, on any video-enabled device, including laptops, tablets and mobile phones. Jeff estimates the investment has already saved OceanaGold tens of thousands of dollars in travel costs. JEFF NAM, This not only streamlines our decision-making and get tasks done faster and for less money, it also means we now have a single source for accurate, up-to-date information.

4 Video conferencing has been fantastic for us, reducing the time and cost of travel, improving our efficiency and productivity, and also providing a better work-life balance for our people. OceanaGold uses SharePoint 2010 to help build a collaborative environment, reduce paper usage and streamline workflows. Spark Digital helped with the initial scoping and design of workflows to automate forms, processes and other business tasks throughout the business. These include application forms used for approving day-to-day expenditure at mines, such as new machinery, equipment and services, as well as forms used by staff to order new IT equipment and applications. SHANE COHEN CLIENT MANAGER, SPARK DIGITAL JEFF NAM Investing in ICT infrastructure Jeff is upgrading the supporting network and server infrastructure to support the company s collaboration and communication needs. He recently extended a fibre network into its underground operations at Frasers Mine. The higher speeds and additional bandwidth are transforming the way operators control underground diggers and equipment. Our machine operators previously worked deep underground in dark, cold and damp conditions with two hours of travel time there and back, Jeff explains. The fibre link has transformed their lives, enabling them to work above ground and eliminating hours of travel each week. OceanaGold and Spark Digital recently completed an upgrade of the company s ICT infrastructure at its Dunedin head office to increase up-time, availability, redundancy and security. They also migrated OceanaGold s backup systems to Spark Digital s Dunedin data centre, to increase network performance and resilience and provide full business continuity in the event of an interruption or disaster. Our backup infrastructure was previously hosted at Macraes Mine, a remote site that made it difficult to diagnose faults and time-consuming to deliver replacements and make fixes.

5 Spark Digital has replaced the old physical infrastructure with virtual servers and storage at its Dunedin data centre to deliver a new private cloud platform that is more responsive to the organisation, with increased up-time, availability and capacity, better security and more resilience. Fit for the future Jeff adds that the Spark Digital team is very adept at meeting the goals he sets for them and making sure that OceanaGold is looked after. Spark Digital is a dependable partner and also provides real leadership, helping us to deliver essential services to support the business, as well as plan for future demand. We ll be participating in a joint strategic planning session with Spark Digital to review the business goals, look at where we want ICT to be in the next five years and how to get there. It will result in a signed off plan to bind the entire team with common goals and agreed metrics for success. Jeff is looking at how best to integrate Cisco CallManager with Microsoft Lync to streamline its communications across voice, video, mobile and messaging. He has re-signed Spark Digital to deliver Microsoft licences over the next 12 months and is working with Spark Digital to extend the trans-tasman data network to additional locations in the Philippines, Melbourne and Toronto using Spark Digital WAN Services. I m also interested in looking at how Spark Digital s cloud technologies could help us scale our delivery of services, particularly to remote operations in Australia, Canada and the Philippines, adds Jeff. For example, we could benefit from Spark Digital s ReadyCloud Collaboration services at temporary sites we set up for exploration and feasibility studies which are invariably in isolated locations with no existing telecommunications services. We work in a fast-growing and challenging environment and Spark Digital will continue to be a critical part of our current and future success, concludes Jeff. For further information please contact your Spark Digital Client Manager or call us on: VCAV0814_7