Bringing simplicity to technological innovation in the mining industry – Kuchera GmbH
There’s no argument that the mining industry needs more innovative solutions if we are to keep pace with the increasing demand for minerals, legislative developments and the decreasing number of people working in the industry. But, it’s something we’ve been talking about as an industry for decades, and having visited several mines since founding Kuchera in 2022, Kumbirai Chipadza, their Chief Marketing Officer, has noticed that everyone still relies heavily on pen-and-paper practices.
On a visit to a mining company, the Kuchera team met a CFO who used a picture of a whiteboard to work with client invoices. At the end of each day, she would send a message to the operations manager on site asking him to take a picture of the board with his mobile phone and send it to her as a text message. She would then spend the next hour zooming in on the picture on her phone and slowly transferring the data into an Excel spreadsheet before adding it to the invoicing documents.
When we asked her why the process was so manual, she told us it’s the way it’s always been. Although technology existed to improve the process, it was either too expensive, too complicated, or she didn’t trust it. It was only by comparing Kuchera’s data with the data on her whiteboard and working with our product team that she began to incorporate our reporting into her process, which has enabled her to grow her business and take on more of the work available in the area.
The challenge of OEM compatibility in the mining industry
Another reason why many companies don’t adopt existing technology is that it’s unfortunately not compatible across their entire fleet. This means that if our former CFO wanted to implement this technology, she would also have to make sure that they stayed loyal to a single OEM provider.
This limits their ability to switch providers based on features or reliability. It would also mean being locked into a fixed price for the software offered by the OEM, which is often too expensive for a small business. Ultimately, leaving them with messaging images of whiteboards to get the billing right. Thankfully, companies like Kuchera have started to enter the market and offer an OEM agnostic solution.
Once her fleet was connected to the Kuchera Cloud, we took the time to show her how the software works. What she was most excited about was how Kuchera automatically tracks the distance travelled by all the vehicles in the fleet, including the gradient to the landfill site. This data confirmed a feeling she had when signing the contract that the landfill was further away than originally thought, with a steeper incline. She was able to use the reports we send her each month to prove this, as well as the daily reports that could replace the whiteboard, so she no longer has to spend hours going back and forth copying and pasting things.
After using Kuchera for a few weeks, she gave us a pretty fantastic review:
“After installing Kuchera, we realised that we had been underbilling for quite some time. In contracting, you can charge per kilometre driven and it turned out that we were driving 1.4km for every 1 km billed. There were always arguments about these figures, but now we can actually go into the Kuchera app and show them exactly what routes our fleet has taken, when they started, when they stopped and the exact mileage.
Our conversations have gone from debating distances to having clear and accurate data that has smoothed the process.
Now, with the extra time and increased revenue, we can invest more time in our business because we have the capacity to scale to new sites and take on new contracts, whereas before we were sort of stuck working out problems in old contracts that didn’t allow us to take on additional work. With the market for mining contractors growing, Kuchera has really come at the perfect time!”
We were really happy hearing how Kuchera was able to impact her operations, but we were quite surprised by the lack of competition in the market, considering how quickly the technology could positively impact operations.
The global mining industry will need to change dramatically
One reason for this could be the dynamic landscape of the global mining industry, which faces unique challenges depending on the people, region and resources that we’re finally starting to address. This includes the technology we’ve developed at Kuchera from 2022, which collects data from the fleet and aggregates it in the Kuchera cloud, before turning it into automated optimisations (including daily and monthly reports for invoicing and sustainability reporting).
Thankfully, we’ve been lucky to have the support of BEUMER Group and their knowledge as FAM in the mining industry. This has helped us enter into many productive conversations with a handful of professionals in the industry across Southern Africa, including Zimbabwe, Mozambique, South Africa and Zimbabwe.
Our story isn’t over yet. During our second deployment this year, we discovered that it wasn’t just the mining contractors that were having problems. We also used Kuchera at a mining site where the operations manager was facing several operational issues, including excessive fuel consumption, increased downtime and even unexpected shutdowns. Most of these could be resolved with just a little more operational visibility, which is relatively easy to obtain if you have the right data.
Still, he was facing the same issue as the contractors: the software was being held behind gated doors, which meant varying platforms, dashboards and technical knowledge to get started.
We showed him Kuchera, and we immediately saw results the next day after connecting his fleet to the Kuchera Connectivity Cloud.
“I was always worried about leaving the mine. It seemed like something always went wrong the moment I went home, so I started spending more and more time on site to make sure everything was going according to plan.
With increased demand for minerals and less workers, it also puts a lot of pressure on operations managers to make sure things are always running according to plan. If something goes wrong or if operations are delayed, even by a few hours, it might mean we don’t make our monthly goals.
With Kuchera, I have all of my operations in a simple dashboard that tracks everything in real time along with monthly forecasting, so I know when to be worried, which takes a ton of pressure off me and the entire team. I can finally spend my time off at home or golfing, knowing that, if I want to, I simply need to check the app on my phone to make sure things are going according to plan.”
Two successful deployments in Southern Africa
During our last deployment in March 2024, we’ve proud to have unlocked significant value for two clients. It’s only been a few weeks, but we’ve already enabled our customers to see a net positive ROI with increased operational efficiency, reduced fuel costs and improved team collaboration.
How did we do it? Here are some of the accomplishments we’ve achieved in just the past few weeks:
Accurate distance reporting up to 100m: We were able to correct invoicing for one mining contractor who was billing 1km for every trip to the dump site, which was actually 1.4km. Thanks to our reports, we were immediately able to spot this discrepancy, leading to a net positive of 40% increased revenue during the next billing cycle.
True inclination reporting: One of our clients charges a standard amount for a 6-degree incline out of a pit. After installing Kuchera, they measured that the incline was actually 11 degrees, which was reported and corrected in the initial contract, unlocking additional revenue.
Optimising operating hours: Thanks to Kuchera’s maintenance overview, operations managers have seen an average increase in uptime from 8.5 hours per shift to 10 hours within the first week of using the app.
Improved accuracy for productive loads: Within the first month, our partners saw an Increased accuracy for productive loads from 80% to 95% by recording actual productive cycles of the asset.
Planned and daily rate of BCM: When operations managers used Kuchera, they saw an average increase in operator output from 6 loads per hours to 8 loads per hour through cycle standardisation times and recommended output rates.
Reduced idling time: With automated optimisations, operations managers had a better overview of their fleet and were able to quickly act to reduce idling time from an average of 3 hours per 12 hour shift to less than 30 minutes thanks to asset positioning and queuing times.
Optimised fuel consumption: We’ve reduced the average fuel consumption from 1,300l to less than 900l across a fleet of 10 dump trucks through monitoring refuelling trips and consumption patterns to create standardisation across assets.
We’re currently looking to speak to mining owners, operators, contractors and government officials working in the industry to learn more about how we could improve Kuchera to fit the industry’s current needs. If you’re interested in speaking with us or even trying Kuchera for your operations, we’d love to hear from you!
You can contact us directly via email at hello@kuchera.global.
Hope to hear from you soon, and thank you for reading more about our story!
