After all, miners have gone from the growth at all costs phase to maximising the productivity of their operations.

Ironically, when the mining boom was at its hottest, a number of clever companies came out with products that were designed to boost productivity.

They often found it hard to get traction because miners just were not thinking that way then.

That is all changing and among the first to notice the change are the funders, which was made quite clear last week when Jolimont Global Mining Systems snapped up a majority stake in blast monitoring specialist Blast Movement Technologies.

Jolimont Global is jointly owned by Melbourne-based technology investor Jolimont Capital and Perth-based Resource Capital Funds.

It has been formed to invest in high growth mining equipment, technology and services companies. Jolimont Global’s rationale is that the METS sector presents outstanding investment opportunities, magnified in an environment of volatile commodity prices and historically high operating costs.

BMT, started in Brisbane in 2005 by Darren and Diane Thornton, is a leader in blast movement technology.

It could be argued that the BMT founders decided that it took balls to really get on top of a blast.

BMT’s patented system is used by miners worldwide to accurately locate ore and waste zones after blasting, allowing accurate separation of ore from waste in the mining process.

This system helps miners make sure they are not discarding valuable ore or carting worthless overburden to the processing plant, saving potentially millions of dollars in profits.

BMT increased revenue 36% in 2014-15 in spite of the global mining downturn.

Exports contributed 77% of BMT’s revenue during the year and grew 63% from the prior year.

BMT founder Darren Thornton said selling the majority stake would allow further growth of the business.

He said the company would leverage Jolimont Global’s experience in building high-growth technology companies and would also give BMT access to Jolimont Global and its part-owner Resource Capital Funds.

“Bringing Jolimont Global and RCF on board as partners and majority owners represents a significant step in our strategy to build our company,” Thornton said.

He said it would be business as usual for the firm, despite the ownership change.

“There is no change to BMT’s identity, operations or plans,” Thornton said.

“We and Jolimont Global have selected key people to augment our management team, which will be announced shortly.”

One change known for sure is that Jolimont Global implementation director Lyle Bruce will be joining the BMT board as chairman.

Bruce was managing director of surface stability radar company GroundProbe from 2003 to 2013. He is also chairs dragline and mining shovel monitoring company MineWare and driver fatigue monitoring systems company SmartCap.

Jolimont Global CEO Lex McArthur will also be joining the board.

BMT’s Blast Movement Monitoring system makes use of Blast Movement Monitors, Activators, Detectors and its BMM Assistant software.

The blast movement measurements provided by the BMM system allow a far more detailed understanding of the actual blast dynamics rather than relying on theory and speculation.

The monitor is a ball-shaped directional transmitter that is programmed and installed in dedicated holes. It can transmit through 25m of rock.

The monitors are simply targets that move with the rock during the blast.

Understandably they have been designed to withstand the extreme conditions within a blast and BMT reckons they suffer far fewer losses than any other method.

The monitors leave the factory in a low power state so they have a long shelf life. The Activator is a remote control devices that provides the signal to turn a monitor on and program certain functions prior to installation into the blast.

The Detector is designed to receive and interpret the signal from the monitors. This lets users quickly find the peak signal that occurs directly above each BMM. The point is surveyed and the signal is recorded by the Detector for later processing by the software.

BMM Assistant is software designed to define ore polygons after blasting and helps users calculate the real outcome from each blast.

“We undertook extensive due diligence on Blast Movement Technologies and were blown away by the testimonials from their customers,” McArthur said.

“Their system can be implement rapidly and immediately reduces dilution and ore loss and lifts operational profit by millions of dollars per blast in many cases.”