The Electra Mining Exhibition will feature an Immersive Technologies Advanced Equipment Simulator on the Komatsu stand. Electra is held in Johannesburg from September 30th until October 4th 2002 from 9am until 5pm. The visitor numbers are expected to top 35,000 as this is one of the world's premier mining Exhibitions.

This Simulator is used by Komatsu South Africa for operator training within their territory.

Simulator training is acknowledged by Mike Blom, Komatsu SA's Operations Director

"It is a tremendous asset both from our point of view and the customers´ because it makes training so much easier, quicker and less costly than doing it on the equipment itself...use of the simulator results in cost savings in a variety of ways.

The cost savings come about mainly because having the Simulator around; you don't need to take a real piece of equipment out of production to do training on. Furthermore by the time the Trainee gets behind the controls of the actual truck or excavator, or whatever it may be, they are much more capable than they would be if they were starting their training on the actual equipment from scratch."
(Excerpt from Septembers Plant Magazine in South Africa.)

Other important advantages of Simulator training pointed out by Mr.Blom in the article are greater safety and less risk of damage to equipment as there is a greater proficiency of the operator when they start on-the-job training and operating.

The Simulator can be programed for day or night, wet or dry conditions, slippery roads and dust or fog. Various maps of mines are programed and the Trainee can be tested on different mines or quarries. Komatsu says that one of the reasons for acquiring the Simulator is that the training is more thorough.

Pieter Cronje, Trainer at Komatsu SA, recently traveled to Botswana to train Operators on the Komatsu HD785-5 rigid dump trucks; the Operators were trained in the Simulator.

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About Immersive Technologies

Immersive Technologies is the world's largest, proven and tested supplier of surface and underground Advanced Equipment Simulators to the global mining industry. The company has achieved this unique position by focusing on its mission to make every mining and earthmoving equipment operator in the world safer and their employer more profitable through its simulation technologies. Immersive Technologies' Advanced Equipment Simulators are helping hundreds of mining companies around the world to increase their equipment operators' safety and site profitability through effective simulation training.

Immersive Technologies provides its customers with the most effective Advanced Equipment Simulators available. This is made possible through the formal exclusive licensing and technical information alliances Immersive has established with the leading Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM), including: Caterpillar, Hitachi, Komatsu and Liebherr. These unique alliances provide Immersive Technologies with exclusive access to the OEM's proprietary and confidential machine technical information that is required to correctly simulate the OEM's machines and is not available through other public or dealer channels.

With advanced simulator modules deployed in 39 countries, Immersive Technologies is dedicated to provide outstanding service. To deliver on this commitment the company has customer sales and support offices located close to its customers in Perth and Brisbane Australia, Salt Lake City USA, Calgary, Ottawa & Vancouver Canada, Monterrey Mexico, Lima Peru, Santiago Chile, Bochum Germany, Johannesburg South Africa, Jakarta Indonesia, Kolkata India and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

Immersive has the global mining experience, innovative technology, product range, OEM relationships, proven support commitment and industry vision to partner with you to ensure your simulator training solution delivers the significant results you expect.