Newtrax breaks through with Gold Fields Down Under

Canadian mining technology firm Newtrax Technologies has won a key sale to South Africa's Gold Fields at one of its main operations hubs in Australia.

Staff reporter

Gold Fields' Invincible mine on Lake Lefroy, near Kambalda in Western Australia. Image: Gold Fields

Newtrax is an emerging IoT technology leader in the niche underground hard rock mine market.

It was selected by Gold Fields to provide a mine-wide asset tracking and proximity detection system at the Invincible gold mine, part of the company's large St Ives camp near Kambalda in Western Australia.

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The sale is strategically important for Newtrax as it builds its presence outside the Americas. It faces stiff competition from domestic suppliers in key markets such as Australia.

In a press release, Newtrax said Invincible, which transitioned from surface to underground mining last year, was set to be Gold Fields' "mine of the future, envisioned to be fully autonomous and remotely operated".

"The Newtrax Personnel and Equipment Tracking solution, which runs on the patented MineHop network, will be deployed on all of St Ives Invincible underground equipment, and used by all underground miners," the supplier said.

"The Newtrax Proximity Detection system utilises MineProx's sub-GHz RF technology to create a peer-to-peer network of equipment and miners. Not only does it give out proximity warnings, the system also provides alerts to loader operators that a truck is on its way even before it appears in its line of sight, enabling operators to prepare for the truck and improve mine production.

"Gold Fields is actively investigating disruptive technology options across all of their mines."