Mining tech, AI, the rise of China and IMARC: A conversation with Mark O’Brien

CITIC Pacific Mining technology and innovation general manager, Mark O’Brien again heads a stellar line-up of experts addressing opportunities and pitfalls in mining’s digital transformation at IMARC 2024 in Sydney. He’s had plenty to say lately about AI, finding time to finish a PhD on AI and ethics, mobile autonomy and how timing can make good ideas great.

Mining Beacon editor Richard Roberts caught up with him for a chat.

Richard Roberts: Firstly, how is the AI ethics PhD going? And how on Earth do you find the time to do that while a mining company GM and being among the headline acts at every third – or is it every second – mining tech conference?

Mark O’Brien: Well, it’s going pretty well, I think. I’m an incrementalist in my approach. An hour a day every day and you’d be surprised how much headway you can make. Plus, I’m a project guy, so I think I plan reasonably well and try to stay focused on priorities without going down too many rabbit holes. But I do have to say no to a lot of things because there’s a lot going on. I’m also the chair of GMG [Global Mining Guidelines Group], which is soaking up bunch of time as well. It’s a busy life, but I mostly enjoy it all, so I’m doing ok.

Richard Roberts: Are you able to talk about any of the interesting things you’re working on at CITIC Pacific Mining, on the digital tech/innovation front, at the moment?

Mark O’Brien: We’re dabbling with some new technologies at the moment but the vast bulk of our current effort has been on a lot of infrastructure refreshes. That’s been the case for the past two years.

With the age of some of our stuff we’ve just hit that point in the lifecycle and it’s been busy. But we try and bake in a little future-proofing into the mix. Our data and analytics people have probably been the most creative in terms of trying out new technologies and innovating around the way we deal with data, integrations and so on.

We have an autonomous drilling program that is now well progressed and that’s a big step for us as a business into a more automated future.

Richard Roberts: I found myself thinking of the, “I don’t like beer anymore” commercials when I read your recent piece on the trouble you were having getting excited about AI amid all the hype. I think most of us are already weary of the “AI sticker on the box” marketing hype, including in mining. But as you’ve said, embedded ML in many mining software/simulation products is already driving positive change across a range of discrete use cases and this is only going to continue to produce valuable, and needed, advances.

Mark O’Brien: Haha, yes, I’m still finding it hard to bother reading some of the tripe being published.

But aside from that I do think AI has a lot to offer and most of the real value will be in the back-office/under-the-hood variety of solutions. I think the GenAI bubble will back off in a bit as people get bored with it and move on. I will say, as an aside, that I think it will open up opportunities for people like yourself. You only have to read a handful of crap articles produced by AI to suddenly realise the massive difference when you read something crafted by an excellent writer.

So, I think the human thing may become a premium product rather than being shuffled off into retirement. I already pay for certain news services because they are a cut above in terms of quality, and I think that trend may increase.

Richard Roberts: If you had to narrow it down to three technology areas, or developments, that you are watching with most interest – vis-à-vis impact in mining – what would they be?

Mark O’Brien: Energy and electrification – obviously related to decarbonisation, but a challenge of its own.

Automation: I still think we’ve got a long way to go on this front. It has lots of connections to other themes like remote operations, intelligent systems, data, etc.

Cross-pollination from other industries. I think we’ve done better at this but we have a long way to go in terms of paying attention to learning from other spaces.

I’ll add a fourth: speed. I think speed is a big problem in mining and we just move too slowly. Far too many miners still aim to be the first to be second, but we’ve got to find creative and disciplined ways to experiment and implement faster. Given the key challenges facing the industry as well as the importance of mining to the reshaping of the future economy, we don’t have time to tinker.

Richard Roberts: On the broader mining 4.0 front, we’ve talked before about the OEMs and largish tech firms buying and integrating mining tech. Do you have a view on how soon, and where/how, we’re likely to see something really game-changing or impactful out of that consolidation process?

Mark O’Brien: This one is a tough one because for many smaller innovative businesses getting picked up by an OEM can seem like a terrific outcome. But experience has showed that trying to bolt things onto legacy products isn’t always a winner, and OEMs can be plodding entities too.

So, some things are like strapping a squirrel to a dinosaur. But occasionally you see some good outcomes here.

Without the leverage of embedded OEMs some of these smaller firms will never get a foot in the door, so it’s a two-edged sword.

I’m not sure I’ve seen anything yet that makes me think someone is going to transform in a surprising and huge way. Mining innovation is tough. In many cases the market is not big enough, with potential to scale, to excite investment types. So it’s the OEMs with a bit of money to splash who have been doing most of the buying.

Richard Roberts: Maybe we are already seeing something game-changing, at the operations/safety management level, through the likes of Gold Fields with its integrated, ‘agnostic’, operations management platform/system, which it has templated in WA and plans to export across its sites, and Roy Hill with, again, equipment and technology agnostic fleet management and out-of-the-box autonomy? Among others.

Mark O’Brien: I think there has definitely been a big move to shrug off ‘lock in’ and the desire for interoperability and plug-and-play options to build hybrid solutions is very attractive.

We’re seeing a number of companies who had rock solid relationships with certain OEMs are suddenly talking up relationships and partnerships with others, and I think that’s going to increase. We’ve faced the same in some quarters where you really want to avoid being stuck with one vendor for certain types of solutions – not just for competitive market tension. Sometimes we just want options if we feel a solution isn’t quite what we’re after.

But again the mining market is smaller than most think and that limits things a bit.

Richard Roberts: At a recent critical minerals conference (cobalt) in New York, it was mentioned, again, that the West has probably been “asleep at the wheel” on critical mineral supply chains and that, “China obviously is leading the world in terms of doing these things and at a pace that we probably are not quite capable of keeping up with just yet”. Similarly, at the recent Electric Mine conference in Perth it was suggested that China was moving fast on mine-vehicle electrification-plus-autonomy and the competitive landscape was changing. Thiess is the world’s biggest surface mining contractor and it has conceded it needs to buy from traditional and non-traditional sources to give it a shot at mobile fleet renewal over the next 5-10 years.

What is your view on the role China plays in the mining equipment/tech transition that evidently is going to play out over the next few years?

Mark O’Brien: I think there’s been a lot of articles and well-informed pieces speaking about the speed at which China has been moving forward on a lot of tech.

I have no doubt that whereas we once mocked poor quality equipment from China, we will be buying it in the not too distant future, partially because it will be commercially attractive but mostly because it will be excellent quality and will get to us faster than some of the traditional western OEMs.

I think their equipment gets better and better with every iteration, so I think it is very likely we’ll be buying more of it.

Just take a look at [Hong Kong-listed] BYD for a great example of the speed at which they have improved in these areas.

Many similar Chinese companies have been supplying the parts for so-called ‘western technology’ for a long time and now they’re producing their own quality products. They will be hard to ignore.

Richard Roberts: You’ve been a regular at IMARC over the years. What’s its most significant role as an industry forum and Australia’s international mining forum? I’m thinking that PDAC, the new Saudi/Future Minerals Forum and maybe one of the big South American events are important because they capture globally significant mining trends/developments with a regional bias and flavour.

Mark O’Brien: I think IMARC is very significant in our region. They do draw a large cross-segment of the industry together. I think the big topics and trends get surfaced, many global and some local.

I also think, from personal experience, that people really missed these during the COVID period, and now that they’re back on they’ve had great attendance and a lot of energy. I always find myself connecting with a lot of industry contacts there, and there’s something really significant about getting that many people into a venue to focus on the industry together.