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Globalizing Ore Procesing

Brent Hutzler - Solvay Mining Solutions
North American Sales Director

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Mon, 10/22/2018 - 13:26

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Mexico’s mining market can thrive under globalization, as more foreign investors and companies venture in and introduce new technologies. But in internationalizing the industry, it is crucial to deliver the right message to the right people, says Brent Hutzler, North American Sales Director for Solvay Mining Solutions’ Mineral Processing group. “When doing business in Mexico, dealing with multinational companies is common,” he says. “Understanding the organizational makeup and who the key people are is extremely important when providing a solution.”
Solvay says it can deliver the right solution to the right people due to the combination of its global resources and local approach, a union that creates value for the industry and enables the company to outperform its competitors. “The way in which we are structured as an organization is unique in comparison to other chemical providers. Our company, being as large as it is, places great emphasis on our ability to support customers,” Hutzler says. He believes that mining chemicals is a broad category and that advertising as such downplays expertise. “Our technical sales group is not focused on providing mining chemicals, but rather value-added mineral processing reagents,” he says.
Hutzler says the ultimate key to creating industry value is to identify the stakeholders who are able to see the value in Solvay’s products. “We want employees with deep industry knowledge, such as process, metallurgical and chemical engineers, who have worked in a production environment and who understand the challenges customers face on a daily basis,” he says. “These are people who can bring the application expertise necessary to demonstrate the performance improvement our solutions bring.”
Yet, even if a company provides the most optimized chemicals, without the correct application, the full value that those chemicals can bring is not realized, Hutzler adds. To better develop the full potential of mining reagents, Solvay innovates and disrupts with new and increasingly sustainable solutions. But given how conservative the industry is when it comes to adopting new technologies, commercializing new products becomes quite a challenge. “Nobody wants to be the first,” he says. “Our strategy is to partner with companies to test our chemistries, so we have a reference point and case studies when going commercial.”
The company is further exploring how to apply its corporate social responsibility approach to its manufacturing process, products and innovation portfolios. “We are focused on providing more sustainable solutions to the mining industry, including NaSH and xanthate replacement products,” he says. “We want to have stable processes that ensure environmental and workforce safety.”
When it comes to safety in ore processing, chemicals logistics demand careful transportation and materials management. “Our supply chain and transportation logistics operations allow us to respond to customers quickly and safely,” Hutzler says. One of Solvay’s largest mining-focused manufacturing plants is in Mexico, with a growing product portfolio onsite, which enables it to provide a faster response to the regional market.
To further ensure dependability, Solvay’s mining group works under a two-year demand scenario. “Every month we consider a two-year forecast of what the global demand for our specialty reagents will be, so we can adapt our manufacturing assets and analyze when we need to expand according to our capacity,” explains Hutzler. The idea is to always have the next expansion plan and equipment ready to be implemented when the right moment arrives to mitigate the possibility of shortages.

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