Organizers of the annual Beyond Digital Transformation (BDT) conference in Sudbury are looking to expand the awareness and importance of the event thanks to a recently announced partnership involving CIM (Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum).
Neha Singh, CEO of PACE (Partners in Achieving Change Excellence) said she was pleased that CIM had joined as BDT’s co-host. Singh said the most important element of the partnership is that CIM sees value in the adoption of new and emerging technologies in the mining industry.
She added that the conference would be more impartial in the sense that presentations would not be added to the agenda just to satisfy a sponsoring business or corporation.
“You have to value technological solutions. This is making sure mining companies can bring their perspective to the table,” said Singh. She said the conference would be staying true its original purposes.
CIM president Roy Slack, who is also chair of the conference, commented in a news release that the BDT event had established itself as an important venue where members of the mining community could meet and focus on the digital transformation of the industry.
“There is much synergy between this young and emerging conference and the broad goals of CIM. It’s Northern Ontario and Sudbury-centric, an area which has traditionally been and continues to be influential and a global leader in our industry,” said Slack.
Another significant change for the conference is that organizers have changed the venue. Whereas the event was originally planned for the United Steelworkers hall on Brady Street, the decision was made to move to Cambrian College where the two-day event (February 5-6, 2020) would be live-streamed on the Orion Network, a dedicated high-speed fibre-optic network that supports research, education and innovation in Ontario.
The new venue is the eDome, part of Cambrian’s Centre for Smart Mining.
Singh credited Slack with the idea of live-casting the event to colleges, universities and even secondary schools to showcase mining innovation. Singh said several educational institutions had requested the live-streaming in the first two years of the conference. She said the Cambrian College venue has the facilities and technology to do the job with a link through the BDT conference website at https://pace.global/events/2020-beyond-digital-transformation-conference/.
“I think this is a first,” said Singh. “I think it is the first time a conference like this will be live cast to the rest of the province. And there is a tonne of people connected to this network. It will raise awareness of what is going on in the industry.”
She added that nearly all the tickets for the event are sold out, but registration is still available at the BDT website: www.beyonddigitaltransformation.com
