10 March 2021 – Master Drilling Group Limited (“Master Drilling”, JSE:MDI), a global leader in providing drilling services to the mining, civil engineering and building construction sectors, today announced a 40% investment in AVA Solutions (“AVA”) a specialist in data-driven mining fleet management solutions.

Founded in 2015 by Anton Fourie and Jason van der Watt, two engineers with over 25 years of combined mining industry experience, AVA has achieved significant recognition in South Africa by creating a captive market for its disruptive, hardware agnostic and quick to implement Software as a Service (SaaS) model at much lower costs to other solutions. Currently, AVA’s unique digital platform analyses and tracks more than 1800 load & haul vehicles across 28 different sites in 5 countries for a range of blue-chip companies.

Danie Pretorius, Master Drilling CEO, said: “Technological innovation is a key priority for Master Drilling as we continue to support our clients to move down the cost curve, optimise their operations and increase safety. Our investment in AVA is aligned with our strategy to diversify our services and invest in opportunities in our existing target markets with low capital requirements and short return cycles. We believe that AVA has great growth potential, and we look forward to supporting them through our existing client base and networks internationally.”

AVA’s solution was shaped by the founders’ knowledge of the mining industry and understanding of the challenges faced in the production environment. By condensing multiple technology layers into a single interface, AVA ensures that equipment operates at its optimal level of performance with little to no additional capital investment.

Traditionally, digital fleet management solutions were only accessible to larger mines, as the costs and capital outlay associated with the solutions were too high. AVA disrupted the category with a solution that is accessible for all mines and asset sizes by simplifying traditionally difficult systems to implement and maintain. Through this offering, the potential market for AVA is vast as many mines that currently struggle to get real value from their digital initiatives are now able to deploy a real end-to-end solution.

Commenting on the partnership, Anton Fourie, co-founder and COO of AVA, said: “We have grown exponentially from a start-up five years ago to a recognised player with a proven technology for the mining industry. We have a clear strategy to provide an end-to-end solution that goes beyond the load and haul environment and across the entire mining value chain. Through our partnership with Master Drilling, we are gaining access to extensive experience that will support the ongoing development of our platform and a footprint that will accelerate our international expansion.”

Understanding the Internet of Things, AVA is able to create vast digital networks that drive communication between multiple pieces of hardware in a mine, providing real time data that empowers operations teams to make decisions that optimise mining operations. The next developments for AVA’s scalable platform will focus on new elements including scheduling and logistics that will enable mines to not only improve productivity of the load and haul value chain but of the entire mining value chain.

Contacts

Master Drilling

Su-Marie Lemmer          marketcomm@masterdrilling.com          +27 18 771 8100

Instinctif Partners (Media and Investor Relations)

Boipelo Mogamisi          boipelo.mogamisi@instinctif.com      +27 82 609 3263

AVA Solutions

Inquiries         info@ava.solutions          +27 11 783 0363

 

Notes to editors


About Master Drilling
“We challenge the status quo to provide our clients with specialised, adaptive and integrated drilling solutions.”
Master Drilling was established in 1986 and listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in 2012. The company delivers innovative drilling technologies and has built trusted partner relationships with blue-chip major and mid-tier companies in the mining, civil engineering and building construction sectors across various commodities worldwide.
The Master Drilling business model of providing drilling solutions to clients through tailor-made designs coupled with a flexible support and logistics chain makes it the preferred drilling partner throughout the lifecycle of projects from exploration to production and capital stages.
www.masterdrilling.com

About AVA Solutions
Founded in 2015, AVA Solutions (AVA) is a leading South African software company that believes in a data-driven approach to mine management. AVA offers a digital solution to clients that gives them a more effective way to manage their fleet with the following advantages:
• Holistic fleet management platform
• Software as a Service (SaaS) leveraging the Internet of Things (IoT)
• Hardware agnostic
• Quick implementation times
• A modern, simple and easy to use user-interface
• Flexible use of GSM, LTE or WiFi to transmit GPS data