ASTEC and OPS share a decade-long partnership. Image: Astec
Astec and OPS are committed to growing each other and the mining industry.
All hands were on deck at the OPS Screening and Crushing Equipment open days on March 21–22.
Held at OPS’s Perth facility, the expo celebrated 35 years of the company supplying critical equipment to Australia’s mining and quarrying industry.
To mark the occasion, OPS welcomed industry players from across the world to take part in two days of exhibitions, presentations and displays.
Rock-to-road solutions expert Astec was a major participant at the event. The company was also celebrating its decade-long partnership with OPS.
“Both Astec and OPS have seen excellent growth through our partnership,” Astec business line manager – material solutions Adam Gordon told Australian Mining.
“A key factor in the relationship is we know we can rely on OPS to provide quality service and expert technicians ready to rise to any challenge.”
Image: Astec
Gordon said OPS is a trusted distributer of Astec’s bulk material handling and fixed plant equipment to mines and quarries in Western Australia, South Australia, the Northern Territory and New South Wales.
And the company distributes Astec’s rock breaker systems, materials handling equipment and ship-loading range Australia-wide.
“Astec manufactures equipment for the entire mineral processing chain, including crushing, screening, handling and washing,” he said.
“It’s big equipment for a big industry, and it requires knowledge, expertise and an extensive range of high-quality products to get the right machines to the right sites.”
Between them, Astec and OPS teams have built hundreds of years of industry experience, including expertise drawn from the 16 respected brands under the Astec umbrella.
“While Astec and OPS are successful businesses in their own right, they’re even better working together,” Gordon said. “We each bring different strengths to the partnership – strengths that we then build on to benefit each other and our customers.
“And with our combined experience, we have the Australian mining and quarrying industries covered.”
According to Gordon, one significant advantage in working together is the companies’ ability to deliver advanced training to teams on the ground.
“We’re very hands-on with our training,” Gordon said. “In fact, we ran multiple, comprehensive training sessions on specific aspects of our equipment at the two-day expo,” Gordon said.
When it comes to ensuring technicians are capable of providing outstanding service to customers, Gordon credits Astec’s tailored approach in ensuring OPS staff members are well equipped to face any challenge.
Image: Astec
“We have a lot of equipment in the thousands-of-tonnes-per-hour range and it’s all very specialised,” he said. “That’s why our training is personalised in a one-on-one environment, to ensure these technicians are able to deliver next level service to our customers.”
Among Astec’s innovative equipment and technology on display at the OPS event was a virtual reality station where attendees could take a virtual tour of Astec’s ship-loading and modular plant crusher facilities.
“Being able to showcase the scale of our capabilities was a major highlight of the event,” Gordon said.
The recent expansion of Astec’s Omagh manufacturing facility in Northern Ireland is another important factor in the company’s ability to support OPS.
“This expansion has effectively doubled our manufacturing capability, meaning we can supply more equipment more often to OPS, thereby keeping our customers up to date with the latest products and critical support when they need it,” he said.
Gordon emphasised that through Astec’s commitment to continuous improvement, the company is already designing and building equipment for the future, and it’s counting on OPS to be with them on that journey.
“We are very proud to be associated with OPS,” Gordon said, “We’re similar businesses, with the same goal of providing our customers with the best possible equipment to meet their needs.
“We work very well together, and we’re looking forward to a great future of growth.”
This feature appeared in the May 2024 issue of Australian Mining.