Boris Kurtsev: "We are optimistic"

Over the past few years, and especially months, the world has changed a lot. Mycromine Russia, which is a partner of the Reliable Change Foundation and its flagship project, the CASE-IN International Engineering Championship, has also undergone changes, not only under the pressure of external circumstances, but also due to a steady desire for growth and development. Boris Vladislavovich Kurtsev, CEO of Mycromine Rus LLC, spoke about the current state of affairs, plans and prospects.

DIGITALIZATION OF PRODUCTION

— Boris Vladislavovich, it's no secret that this year has been difficult for many sectors of the economy. What trends are observed in your field in general and the company in particular?

— In Russia, there are now widespread trends towards the creation of a digital twin of a single information space and the introduction of unpopulated mining technology.

With the development of information technology over the past few years, Russia has made great strides. Now we no longer just supply licenses with technical support, but carry out comprehensive implementation of information solutions in production. We are getting closer and closer to the integrated digitalization of the enterprise, creating a springboard and platform for it. The next step is already unpopulated mining technologies and a full—fledged digital twin of the field.

An important aspect of this philosophy is: what we change in the virtual space must fully correspond to what is happening in real life.

A digital model of the deposit has been created on the computer, where we see in real time how the equipment works, what rocks and ores it ships, physical and mechanical properties, content, and so on. If we need to move equipment from one face to another, we do it with a mouse click. For example, on the screen, we transfer working equipment from one face to another, and at the same second a signal is sent to the on-board computer with this task to be completed. If this is an employee of the mine, then he receives a signal in the application that tells him where he needs to move.

At the same time, full control and planning of the ore flow is carried out.

In addition to safety, economic efficiency is very important. We understand that by optimizing human resources, cycle time, and reducing equipment wear (due to more accurate and uniform operation), mining robotics leads to cost savings.

For example, let's give our project on mining automation, primarily the automatic collection of data from work units. I can't say the name of the company yet, because there hasn't been an official press release yet, but the project has actually been completed. To determine the transportation cycles of loading and delivery equipment, we applied our new solution, machine vision. Due to the camera installed on the equipment and the previously trained neural network model, machine vision allows you to determine the time spent on each technological operation during transportation, as well as the statuses of the equipment during the shift.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg of technologies that have already been implemented, which are currently being developed and which will continue to be implemented as part of this project. The task was very interesting, primarily because no one had ever done this before. It's great that we, together with the customer, were the first to succeed. This solution, having passed certain stages of testing and operation, has been successfully put into commercial operation.

All technologies lead to an increase in the market and an increase in the space for further production.

If we are talking about robotics, unpopulated mining, digital twins, and remote influence on production, then we also keep in mind the possibility of mining from the bottom of rivers, seas, and oceans, and further on to cosmic bodies. At the moment, this may seem like a very fantastic scenario for the development of events, but I assume, I want to believe, that this is the event horizon of the next 30-40 years.

In the near future, the number of people underground will be minimized and production will be controlled directly from the surface. I would not like to touch deeply on the moral and professional aspects of such forecasts now, because, as a mining engineer, I deeply appreciate the work of my colleagues and believe that it is impossible to replace a person in the mining industry, but it is possible to reduce his involvement in the mining process directly at the deposit for the sake of his own safety and comfort. In any case, before making any sudden movements, the management of companies needs to seriously consider this problem. Perhaps we should contact the academic community and work out this highly social issue with them.

INNOVATION

— Here you are talking about development and innovation. How does this happen in your country? How are new features designed? How is all this implemented?

— The fact is that our products — the mining and geological information system, the dispatching system, the database management system - are, firstly, rather high—tech tools, and secondly, they are ... I'll probably use the word "artisanal" here. Geologists, miners, and industrialists create their craft. They don't always care how statistics are calculated or which algorithm is used to optimize their career. The convenience of tools is important. Small, invisible "features" are important, which greatly facilitate everyday work. For users who work with similar products day in and day out, it is very important that "the hammer fits comfortably in their hand." Our company spends enormous efforts, including on such things.

In other words, we can divide the development of our products into two main development paths.

The first is innovation, strategic product development (new features, new modules, global improvements), thanks to which we offer something innovative and interesting to the market.

The second point is the refinement of existing solutions. This is a regular dialogue with those very "artisans", working with their recommendations and sometimes even requirements.

We currently have a fairly serious carte blanche on the part of our developers from Australia. Two people from our Moscow office are on the product development committee, and we have the opportunity to influence the development vector of our programs. Evgenia Shulga, a product analyst, has been working in Russia for about a year now. She collects all the wishes of our customers, analyzes them, transforms these wishes into a form that is acceptable to our developers, and implements the requested functionality through our Product Strategy Manager.

Starting in 2020, new versions of Micromine will be released twice a year. We had a Micromine 2020.5 release in May, and the next Micromine 2021 release is scheduled for the end of November. Moreover, we are pleased to provide users with our new MM version for one month absolutely free of charge, so that colleagues can personally try out new functions and tools.

I really hope that this way we will be able to show our users significant progress. MICROMINE has long been famous for responding quite effectively and energetically to the suggestions of our users, we are developing dynamically, but now we want to be ahead of the entire market in this matter.

Continuation – on the website of the Globus magazine. Geology and Business".