The world is more connected than ever, and mining technology and service companies are no exception. As they expand their reach globally, they need to follow their clients to new markets, from a copper mine high in the Andes to the icey cold winters of Northern Canada. When exploring new markets, it’s the classic “chicken or egg” dilemma: You want to see success before committing to the expenses of a local operation, but as soon as you start generating revenue, the risk of being classified as a PE increases.
Chile has a large pipeline of solar and wind projects that will be built in the next few years, but it does not do much if there is no way to dispatch the power to where it is needed. For this reason, transmission capacity is one of the most important issues that needs to be solved in the short to medium term.
Anglo Americans’s Innovation and Technology Manager, Rodrigo Subiabre, presented some details on the company’s technology push at the Copper 2022 conference held last week in Santiago. For mining technology and service companies, updates such as these give insight into where the industry is going.
Although mining companies are increasingly open to innovation these days, there are still challenges for technology and service providers to navigate these companies. Mining companies are using open innovation calls to give more visibility to the problems they are trying to solve. We have provided a list of open innovation resources for South America.
When companies initially incorporate an entity in Chile, corporate governance is not always a priority in the beginning stages of opening the business. The reality is that how we grant powers will play an important role in how efficiently the company will operate and whether the foreign shareholder is protected.
Argentina has a healthy lithium project pipeline. There are already two projects in production with plans for expansions. This year, construction has started on several more projects and there are even more projects that are being explored.
Ecuador is emerging as a mining investment hot spot in Latin America. There is already two projects in production and some world class discoveries that should be built over the next few years. Check out the project pipeline for details.
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