Metal Tech News - The Elements of Innovation Discovered

Keeping in alignment with overall mining safety and efficiency, Hexagon AB's mining division unveiled its Power of One platform, a holistic, life-of-mine smart solution connecting sensors, software, infield apps, and cloudware to complete an ecosystem of monitoring and productivity.

Hexagon, a global information technology company specializing in hardware and software solutions, has an extremely diverse portfolio of subsidiaries that branches into multiple market sectors, from agriculture to energy and much more.

Under its banner, Hexagon's mining division is a global leader in sensor, software, and autonomous technologies by leveraging data to boost efficiency, productivity and quality across industrial, manufacturing, infrastructure, safety, and mobility applications.

"The Power of One platform is a landmark enabler for next-generation automation," said Nick Hare, president of Hexagon's mining division. "It offers mines a uniquely intelligent approach based on open architecture to autonomously connect key mining ecosystems, such as exploration, planning, drill and blast, material movement and mine monitoring. It's the scalable, platform-agnostic answer to challenges previously addressed by point solutions and multiple vendors."

Unveiled at HxGN LIVE Global, Hexagon's digital reality solutions conference, Power of One harnesses data from multiple sensors in a simple and consolidated software architecture, which can help mines become situationally aware, self-learning, and autonomously connected in the field and in the cloud.

The Power of One platform not only links a mine together to create an umbrella of information regarding the condition of the mine site, but many of its latest options improve safety and perception of the processes that are part of everyday life for most operations.

One of the best examples is HxGN MineMeasure, the newest portfolio for the drill and blast process.

Drilling and blasting operations impact the entire mining process, from mining equipment efficiency, through crushing and grinding circuit performance to recoveries and final product quality. Costs and energy usage increase throughout the comminution process and efforts at targeting optimization of the blasting process often pay huge dividends down the line, reducing costs and energy consumption.

MineMeasure connects every aspect of the blasting process. From design and execution to blast movement and fragmentation analysis, information at each step is captured, allowing supervisors to receive continuous feedback to make better-informed decisions.

"MineMeasure is a truly autonomous connected ecosystem," Hare said during an interview at the 2021 MINExpo. "When you're able to consider all inputs to those variables, you are able to have the maximum output for your customers. It is the highest return in investment we can offer our customers. It brings all of our technologies into one portfolio and it truly demonstrates the Power of One."

For customers, the platform offers an effortless experience with a seamless UI- (user interface) UX (user experience) and consistent functionality.

Reduced cost of ownership, reduced deployment and training time, reduced supply chain complexity, and increased operator adoption are just some of the platform's many benefits, according to Hexagon.

"For the first time, one technology partner connects the mine to the boardroom via a single onboard ecosystem comprising a smart computer, antenna and display," said Rob Daw, chief information officer of Hexagon's mining division. "This marks the fulfillment of a commitment to connect all parts of a mine and for the industry, it points the way to a safer, more productive and sustainable future."

You can learn more about the Power of One platform at the ongoing Intelligent Mining Summit – https://hxgnlive.com/global/summits/intelligent-mining – which will continue until June 23.