Volume 9 Edition 3 2012 - The ASIA Miner

Supplier NewsGemcom grows along with Asia’s mining industryCENTRAL Asia and Mongolia are major growthareas for the mining industry and GemcomSoftware International is firmly established inboth regions supplying a package of qualityproducts backed up by full service which benefitsall users, large and small.Gemcom’s president Rick Moignard saysthe company’s big expansion markets are inAsia and these markets are served by officesin Kazakhstan and Mongolia. “In Central Asiawe have signed contracts with a number ofmajor players, including NRC, Kazmys andArcellor-Mittal, all of which have big opera -tions not just in the r egion but around theworld and they are global contracts for us.“It’s a very good business for us in Kazakhstanand it’s the fact that we supply both thesoftware and the services that has made itwork. It’s also because we ar e working withcompanies to set up pr ocesses around howtheir software implementation should be andwhat standard practices should be which enablesthem to r oll those solutions globally .Companies want to pursue this because findinggood geologists, mining engineers andother professionals is a challenge everywhere.”Rick Moignard says gr owth in sales ishappening all over the world for Gemcomwith record sales in of all five of its regionsin the past 12 months. “Every r egion soldmore of our pr oduct while our servicesbusiness is up in every r egion twice whatit was the previous year.”“This is because of the market, the shortageof labour, and the fact we can supplythe software and the services. All of thispackaged together is a compelling storyand is very much a focus of ours. We wantour customers to get the most value theycan out of the product so we’re not lookingat just dropping it in their laps and saying‘here you go, take the product away’.”Commenting on the company’s global expansion,Rick Moignar d says Gemcomseems to be able to find the next place that isgoing to open up to mining. “For instance,Gemcom’s Kazakhstan team with some clients at the opening of the Kazakhstan office last year.we’ve been in Mongolia for five or six years.We set up and worked with the gover nmentto help set the standards and we have beenable to mature that into an office and now intoa regional office. Initially in Kazakhstan five orsix years ago we had a r e-seller and thenmerged that re-seller into our business andhave grown every year since.“This was also the case in India. W e werethere long befor e anyone else and establishedour presence. Today, in Africa our businessis really strong. We did a lot of work inWest Africa and are now doing a lot more inEast Africa. Most of this is out of the regionaloffice in Johannesburg although we have asatellite office in Ghana and are looking to setup a third office in West Africa to cover moreof the French-speaking area.“Indonesia is another gr eat market. W ehave hit the coal market ther e hard and theMinex product is well recognized. We havean office in Jakarta and have major customerslike Banpu and PT Borneo that are installingthe product and putting in processesaround it. We are strong in the Philippinesand have been there for a long time. Thingsare looking very good there and it has a verystrong future,” Rick Moignard says.“There will be some new pr oduct roll-outslater in the year and Gemcom is looking atsome acquisitions involving people whoseem keen to work with us going forwar d.These deals will enable us to introduce reallygood components that some people havebuilt in certain areas, then take them globallyand have them work within our suite of products.This helps our customers because wecan provide more robust solutions to bettersuit their needs,” he adds.Hitachi to expand Indonesian capacityHITACHI Construction Machinery will boostoutput capacity in Indonesia to meet demandfor construction, for estry and mining equipment.The annual capacity of the company’ splant in Cibitung, West Java, will rise 67% to5500 units by March 2014, from 3300 currently.Hitachi Construction Machinery will alsobuild a second Indonesian plant in Cibitungto make underground carriages as part of aUS$570 million plan to expand its ability toproduce large mining equipment.The company’s chief executive officer MichijiroKikawa said recently that Indonesia’s centralbank was forecasting economic growth toaccelerate to as much as 6.7% this year as thegovernment boosts spending on railways, airportsand roads. Across the industry, excavatorsales in Indonesia will rise 40%, faster thanan estimated 15% increase in India. “Demandin Indonesia will grow at a faster pace than wehad thought and we ar e accelerating expansionto catch up with demand.”He said that Indonesia, North Americaand Japan would boost global demand forexcavators by 7% to 10% in the financialyear starting April 1. Demand in Eur opewould fall because of its sovereign debt crisis,while Chinese sales were likely to be inline with global growth aided by a recoveryexpected after mid-2012.Construction machinery makers are relying onsales in countries such as Indonesia after Chinaslowed public works and housing projects.74 | ASIA Miner | May/June 2012