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WHY STRATFLOW?
We work on the whole mine, starting from the constraint.
Most improvement programmes work department by department. Each area becomes more efficient, yet the mine often ships no more than before. Stratflow starts from the one resource that sets mine-wide output, and from the daily decisions that keep it running at maximum utilisation.
1. We start with the constraint
We use your daily production data and understanding of the system to find the constraint and check that it sits in the right place. Effort then goes where it changes saleable tonnes.
2. We add a layer to your MOS
A daily 30-minute Flow Room brings operations, maintenance, planning and processing together to protect constraint throughput over the next 12 to 48 hours. Your existing management routines stay in place.
3. Your people own the change
Site teams design the buffers, triggers and decision rights with us, so the new way of working belongs to the site and holds after we leave.
4. The first step is small and reversible
We begin by shadowing the planned changes for a few weeks, with decision points agreed up front. As one manager told his team, it could be turned off and the mine could go back to the old way overnight.
5. We can share the risk
Where it suits the client, part of our fee is tied to agreed results.
Where the method comes from
The late Arrie van Niekerk pioneered the application of Theory of Constraints in mining, and the method has been used in more than 90 mining interventions since 2000. Hendrik Lourens worked with Arrie from 2013 and developed it further as the Flow Room. At an Australian longwall mine, annual production rose from a 2.4 Mt average to 3.2 Mt in 2024, with no additional people and no or very little capital.
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