Remote location, staff who live off-site, and a lack of pre-made solutions meant that Kaunis Iron was in an uphill battle to open their first mine site. But with the help of Novacura Flow, they were able to take control of the mining supply chain.

We spoke with Martin Hjärtström, Technical Development Manager at Kaunis Iron, and Östen Westman, Sales Director at Novacura, to learn more.

The problem: a need for mobility and remote data

Kaunis Iron is located in the municipality of Pajala in northern Sweden, a sparsely populated area close to the Finnish border. The area is rich in iron ore, which makes it a great place for an iron mine.

Northland Resources began constructing the mine in Kaunisvaara in December 2011.

However, the mine went bankrupt in October 2014 due to low iron ore prices and high debts. Kaunis Iron took over the bankruptcy estate in 2018.

Taking over an existing yet bankrupt property meant there was a lot of pressure to get the production up and running—and showing a profit—as quickly as possible. Additionally, the remote location of the mine meant that some key staff were only able to be on-site part of the time. Mobility and remote tools were on the top of Kaunis Iron’s list of requirements.

The first thing we needed was an app that we could use to get figures and numbers of the production rate.
Martin Hjärtström
KAUNIS IRON, Technical Development Manager

Using Novacura Flow as an integration platform, Kaunis was able to take data from their various business systems and use that data to create reports, dashboards, and mobile applications.

The solution: system integration combined with production and financial data

Kaunis Iron has worked with several different systems and wanted to find the way to retrieve data from their systems and make it available for mobile devices. Theirs systems were good enough to cover particular business requirements but none of these could provide solution for general integration. Kaunis Iron came to the conclusion early in the project that each system has its benefits and is ready to deliver that data to another system. With Novacura they went mobile and were able to implement a solution to combine data from different systems.

  • Hourly and daily production reports for everyone being up-to-date with the production
  • Integrated systems making data reliable and doesn’t have to be repeated
  • Workflow solutions to streamline processes in production, warehouse, etc.

Once the systems were connected, Novacura created a production reporting app so that employees and contractors could receive hourly and daily production reports. The app allows them to see current output, compare output to previous days, and plan ahead to meet the next day’s goal.

The Novacura solution also includes applications for workers to submit/process work orders, report their time, receive goods to the warehouse, and issue warehouse materials as needed. All the applications work on both desktop and mobile devices.

The Novacura solution allows everyone to share the same information. If the Kaunis Iron management team (or someone else supporting them in the project) are off-site, they were able always to be updated remotely. Since they implemented Novacura FLOW, every glitch in the system, is possible to be fixed right away. They share the info and they know the data is valid: it’s come from the production system right into the ERP.

The results: fast, reliable data and higher productivity

  • Better control over all data
  • More productive workers
  • Quicker decision-making time

Good and reliable data is the foundation on which everything else is built.

I think it’s freaking impressive what [Kaunis Iron] have done: they’ve restarted a mine and made it successful,. They had a plan, they stuck to the plan, and they have so far delivered better than predicted.
Östen Westman
Novacura, Sales Director

The data gave Kaunis Iron answers on how to do all the development. Kaunis Iron was able to achieve their main goal, which was to use Novacura and IFS as the base platform for data. Large production system for managing the mine, and the ABB system for managing the enrichment process was integrated under digital control system umbrella. They are able still to collect data from these systems and combine everything with economic numbers. Novacura was now implemented to maintain and manage of spare parts for the whole company.

We can use the systems that we want to use and Novacura Flow for integrating them so that data can get from one place to another,
Martin Hjärtström
KAUNIS IRON, Technical Development Manager

Kaunis Iron can turn all used and collected data into something that gives them control over the whole process. It helps make better decisions and let them see everything you want to see, without having to use fewer systems that don’t fulfill your requirements.