MX Deposit: Drilling and Sample Data Management

This presentation was recorded at PDAC 2020.

Overview

Video Transcript

[00:00:10.800]<v ->My name is David Kerr.</v>

[00:00:12.090]I’m the head of product at Minalytix

[00:00:14.790]and our product is MX Deposit for anybody who’s not aware.

[00:00:18.300]I’m very happy to be here today and talk to you

[00:00:20.700]about what we’ve been working on over the past year,

[00:00:23.430]and maybe specifically over the last six months,

[00:00:25.960]and just some idea of where we’re going over the next year

[00:00:28.990]and some of the priorities that we’re working on,

[00:00:30.347]and some of the features that we hope to serve out to you

[00:00:33.430]as our customers or potential customers

[00:00:36.060]really just give you some insights

[00:00:37.520]of what we’re thinking about and where we see this heading

[00:00:40.400]and how we’re helping you to solve your challenges.

[00:00:45.035]For those that maybe don’t know who we are.

[00:00:46.690]So, we are a partner with Seequent,

[00:00:48.940]but we are an independent company

[00:00:51.000]that is the sole developers of MX Deposit,

[00:00:54.950]which is a software as a service drill hole

[00:00:56.980]sample data management platform.

[00:00:58.950]Happy to talk about this with anybody,

[00:01:00.850]we actually have our own booth over in the 300 Series,

[00:01:03.390]so if anyone wants to get an in-depth demo

[00:01:05.950]or talk about some specific scenarios,

[00:01:08.050]come and see us, we’ll happy to go through it with you.

[00:01:11.500]So, one of the biggest things that we’re really proud of

[00:01:13.670]is that now we’ve officially released our iOS app.

[00:01:17.270]We’ve had an Android app for a while now

[00:01:19.350]so that’s been our first mobile app to market,

[00:01:22.720]and we’ve been busy working on the iOS equivalent of that.

[00:01:25.520]So, happy to say that now this is up on the App Store

[00:01:28.870]so you can go through the App Store and search for it

[00:01:31.520]and you’ll find it and this is a supporting module

[00:01:36.060]for your MX Deposit instance.

[00:01:37.510]So, this is where you get to interact

[00:01:40.100]with all of the templates and the picklist

[00:01:41.947]and the logging schemes that you’ve created

[00:01:44.340]in your MX Deposit instance,

[00:01:46.080]and users can then work offline

[00:01:48.140]with a local copy of the data while it’s still being entered

[00:01:52.460]through these standardized lists,

[00:01:54.320]and you’ve got that confidence

[00:01:55.860]and that integrity of the data.

[00:01:58.380]Users can also use GPS devices to grab coordinates,

[00:02:02.440]they can use their device camera to take pictures,

[00:02:05.980]and then all that data gets synchronized up to the web app

[00:02:08.840]when they get back to an internet connection.

[00:02:10.780]So, our Android app has been doing this for a few years,

[00:02:13.840]and now it’s the iOS equivalent.

[00:02:15.760]And we’ve got more coming in this mobile space

[00:02:18.260]so, happy to just now be across different platforms.

[00:02:22.600]Something that also we just recently released

[00:02:25.680]is this idea of these ranked sample results.

[00:02:28.720]So, the challenge that we were really trying to solve here

[00:02:31.620]is managing multiple sets of results

[00:02:35.130]in over limit scenarios or maybe it’s across different labs

[00:02:39.110]so, it’s this idea that you might have metallic screen,

[00:02:43.070]gold results and gravimetric results and AA results.

[00:02:46.740]And it’s this ability now to maintain kind of the final

[00:02:50.120]or the best value.

[00:02:51.490]So, using this ranked feature, you’re able to define

[00:02:55.560]these final or best outputs that you want,

[00:02:58.880]including what unit of measure that’s in.

[00:03:01.130]So, we’ve built in the unit conversions for you

[00:03:03.950]going from parts per million to parts per billion

[00:03:06.150]or percent to parts per million, whatever that might be,

[00:03:09.270]but ultimately defining your own set of instructions

[00:03:13.240]in terms of what’s that ranking.

[00:03:15.160]So, we know that the metallic screen results

[00:03:17.580]are more important to us than the gravimetric,

[00:03:20.320]which are more important to us than the AA.

[00:03:22.240]So, it’s just working through those with that ranking logic,

[00:03:24.930]and always giving you that final value to use in your models

[00:03:28.131]and downstream into other systems.

[00:03:31.110]And the system actually maintains

[00:03:33.300]every one of those results.

[00:03:34.600]So at any point in time you can go in

[00:03:36.930]and look at any individual result

[00:03:39.270]and see the different results that have gone into that

[00:03:42.540]and see the different rankings that have gone into that.

[00:03:44.650]So, full audit trail around how you came

[00:03:47.210]to these final values.

[00:03:50.900]One of the things that we’re always trying to do

[00:03:53.560]with MX Deposit is really just give power

[00:03:55.830]and control into our users’ hands.

[00:03:58.110]And so, one of the things that we’ve recently released

[00:04:00.370]is this a walkthrough kind of capability

[00:04:03.320]and these what we call app cues.

[00:04:05.480]So, it serves a couple of different purposes.

[00:04:07.490]So, one of the scenarios that we’re after is new customers,

[00:04:10.810]so it’s this initial onboarding,

[00:04:13.230]this is something that we typically would help you with,

[00:04:16.240]which we are still doing,

[00:04:18.030]but really what we want to give you as a user

[00:04:21.250]is the ability to learn this stuff at your own pace

[00:04:24.530]and on your own time.

[00:04:25.820]So, this is just stepping you through the basics

[00:04:30.900]of how to set up picklist and how to set up the data model

[00:04:33.910]and how to set up projects and users,

[00:04:35.890]and just walking you through how to do it,

[00:04:38.340]where to click and then giving you an explanation

[00:04:41.440]of the various concepts of the system,

[00:04:44.020]and really just giving you that information

[00:04:46.120]to get up and running on your own.

[00:04:48.520]We are always there to help,

[00:04:49.670]but really we just want people to be self-sufficient

[00:04:52.260]from day one and so whatever we can do

[00:04:55.010]to just give you this information

[00:04:57.051]and get you up and running as fast as possible.

[00:05:00.830]We’re also using this to announce new features

[00:05:03.410]and new options in the software.

[00:05:04.950]So, expect on a monthly or every couple of months

[00:05:08.600]that you’ll log in and get one of these notifications

[00:05:11.350]that announces the new feature that’s been put out.

[00:05:14.480]And in some cases it might link you to an article

[00:05:16.980]that describes how to do it

[00:05:18.510]and in other cases, again, it’s going to walk you through

[00:05:21.570]how to use this new feature,

[00:05:23.270]what challenges we’re trying to solve

[00:05:25.330]and how we’ve gone about it.

[00:05:28.620]One of the features that we released

[00:05:31.290]probably about six months ago at this point

[00:05:33.180]is this concept of these associated columns.

[00:05:36.200]So, what was happening is people were sometimes

[00:05:38.930]presenting to us these logging templates

[00:05:41.750]that were really kind of all encompassing.

[00:05:43.820]So, the example that I’ve got up for us

[00:05:46.220]is a up-fairly complex structural log

[00:05:49.330]that a customer was doing.

[00:05:51.470]But really the scenario here is that not all inputs apply

[00:05:56.220]to all structure types.

[00:05:58.710]So, what we’ve introduced as far as functionality goes

[00:06:02.470]is this ability to really dynamically hide and show fields.

[00:06:08.410]And it’s always being driven off of some input.

[00:06:11.170]So, in this case, what we see on the left

[00:06:13.320]is all the different structure types

[00:06:14.970]that a user is going to be able to choose from.

[00:06:17.530]And as they might choose one option or the other,

[00:06:20.640]then you’re able to indicate which fields

[00:06:23.890]the user should be filling out now.

[00:06:26.200]So, it serves not only a workflow purpose

[00:06:30.420]in helping to drive the logger,

[00:06:32.240]just to say, “Look if you’re logging a shear zone here,

[00:06:36.677]“then these are all the other inputs

[00:06:38.197]“that we’re expecting you to fill out.”

[00:06:40.550]And then that can change depending on

[00:06:42.440]what kind of structure you’re logging.

[00:06:44.570]And so, it just makes sure that people are capturing

[00:06:47.050]the information that we want them to capture,

[00:06:49.100]and that they’re not bombarded

[00:06:51.670]with a shear volume of columns or fields.

[00:06:54.430]So, it really just drives to that data integrity

[00:06:56.630]and really enabling that logging process.

[00:07:02.220]Something that’s a bit of an introduction

[00:07:04.470]to what will ultimately be a full workflow module

[00:07:09.010]is this ability to start locking out your drill holes,

[00:07:13.630]and your points.

[00:07:14.660]So, the challenge and the scenario that was presented to us

[00:07:18.730]was saying, “Look, we’ve done our logging,

[00:07:22.087]“we’ve submitted our samples,

[00:07:23.817]“we’ve got all our sample results,

[00:07:25.767]“how do we now just lock this down?

[00:07:28.107]“We don’t want anybody to be making further changes,

[00:07:31.177]“It’s a verified, completed, let’s lock it down.”

[00:07:33.910]So, we’ve now got this idea of a state of an object.

[00:07:38.960]So, a drill hole or a point can be in one of a few states,

[00:07:43.740]so whether it’s inactive, which means we’re working on it,

[00:07:47.220]it can be locked out, which means we can still look at it

[00:07:50.500]and we can still bring it with us offline even,

[00:07:53.100]but we can’t work on it.

[00:07:55.137]So, we can’t add any more data to it,

[00:07:57.240]we can’t import assay results

[00:07:59.220]because somebody basically validated

[00:08:01.410]and verified that this hole is “complete”.

[00:08:04.930]And then the other option is to archive a whole outright,

[00:08:07.440]which basically serves the same lockout purpose,

[00:08:11.100]but removes it from the working set.

[00:08:12.930]So, now these archive tolls,

[00:08:14.320]and just kind of living in an archive state,

[00:08:16.280]and they’re not going to be bombarding your screen,

[00:08:18.380]and you’re not going to see those hundred

[00:08:19.870]historical drill holes.

[00:08:22.520]And where this will ultimately lead us

[00:08:24.470]is into a proper workflow module

[00:08:27.270]where you’re going to have statuses

[00:08:28.850]that kind of live on top of these states.

[00:08:31.880]And then transitioning from one status to the next

[00:08:34.340]can then affect the state.

[00:08:36.410]So a simple example is,

[00:08:38.230]a drill hole going from a planned status

[00:08:41.090]to a it’s being drilled, to we’re logging it,

[00:08:44.510]to it’s been submitted to the lab,

[00:08:46.760]now we’re waiting for assays

[00:08:48.100]and the final status could be it’s completed

[00:08:50.540]or it’s verified.

[00:08:51.760]And at what point and at what transition

[00:08:54.510]does it get locked down, at what point does it get archived

[00:08:57.830]and what are the validations or the checks

[00:09:00.290]that we should be performing between those steps.

[00:09:02.970]So, that’s where we’re going with this

[00:09:05.010]and look for movement in that space in the following year.

[00:09:11.010]So, that really kind of summarizes the last year,

[00:09:14.790]I would say, that we’ve been working on,

[00:09:17.500]we’ve been busy and what’s really nice about MX Deposit

[00:09:20.630]and the system that we’ve built,

[00:09:22.520]is that when we push these features out,

[00:09:25.460]they’re available for everybody.

[00:09:27.420]Nobody had to upgrade their system,

[00:09:30.140]it really was everybody logged in one day

[00:09:33.000]and we had pushed a bunch of features the night before.

[00:09:35.620]So, this is a really nice ability for us

[00:09:38.670]as a software development company

[00:09:40.040]to really just get these out, get them into your hands,

[00:09:43.870]announce them, we’re excited about it.

[00:09:45.290]People have been talking to us about it for a while,

[00:09:47.450]so we really want to make you aware of what we’ve been doing.

[00:09:51.040]Some new options, some new ways to solve your challenges,

[00:09:54.120]and then here’s a walkthrough on how to use it.

[00:09:56.510]So again, self-sufficient,

[00:09:58.800]and really just giving you that power in that flexibility

[00:10:01.248]to do everything on your own.

[00:10:04.467]So, the last thing that we’ll just talk about quickly here

[00:10:07.100]is our current priorities.

[00:10:09.240]So I don’t like to, you know, it’s effectively the roadmap,

[00:10:12.720]but we really operate off of priorities

[00:10:16.410]and it’s really in this agile mentality.

[00:10:19.820]So, we’re always working off of what our priorities today,

[00:10:22.710]and we’re always, re-evaluating what those priorities are.

[00:10:25.490]And then what are we working on,

[00:10:27.470]and how do the things that we’re working on

[00:10:29.980]compare to those priorities.

[00:10:31.900]And what that lets us do is be reactive

[00:10:35.020]to changing priorities.

[00:10:36.690]So, this is why I kind of phrase it in terms

[00:10:40.070]of our current priorities

[00:10:41.530]and I don’t put up a product roadmap.

[00:10:44.984]So, the stuff that we’re working on immediately

[00:10:47.470]and for short-term release.

[00:10:50.160]So, one of the big ones is this idea

[00:10:52.520]of these export templates.

[00:10:54.230]So, if anybody has been using the system,

[00:10:56.750]you know that our current export capabilities

[00:10:58.930]is kind of an all or nothing thing, right?

[00:11:00.930]So, you want to export your drill holes or your points,

[00:11:04.170]pick and choose the holes that you want to dump out

[00:11:06.110]and it just dumps out everything.

[00:11:09.280]So, we’re going to give you a little more flexibility,

[00:11:11.730]a little more control to pick and choose

[00:11:13.680]exactly what you want to export,

[00:11:15.870]what do you want it to look like, change your labels.

[00:11:18.860]We’re going to to introduce some capabilities

[00:11:20.660]around managing different sets of downhole survey data,

[00:11:24.760]managing different sets of color coordinates,

[00:11:27.370]and the rankings around that.

[00:11:29.310]So, we always want to make sure

[00:11:30.600]that the most accurate downhole survey data

[00:11:32.660]is making its way out into your model,

[00:11:34.930]and the most accurate color coordinate

[00:11:36.760]is the one that you’re using.

[00:11:37.900]So, it’s mechanisms of just simplifying

[00:11:40.950]and enabling those kinds of scenarios.

[00:11:43.860]You’ll be able to create as many of these templates

[00:11:45.770]as you want.

[00:11:46.603]So, whatever those use cases and scenarios are

[00:11:49.330]that you need a particular export template,

[00:11:52.430]go ahead and create one, everybody can do it

[00:11:55.720]and you can even create these kinds of global

[00:11:57.660]or shared templates,

[00:11:58.900]so if you do have a centralized data manager

[00:12:03.080]who can create these for the team,

[00:12:04.750]so, lots of flexibility there.

[00:12:07.840]Something that we’ve been talking about for a while

[00:12:10.355]and we’ve started to see a little bit of movement on now

[00:12:13.770]is an integration with the index hub IQ.

[00:12:16.610]So, for anybody who’s already Seequent users,

[00:12:19.925]I know that they’ve built an integration

[00:12:22.190]with their central platform,

[00:12:23.620]so, we’re basically going to do a similar integration

[00:12:26.570]with MX Deposit.

[00:12:27.690]So, this is where your downhole survey data is going to live

[00:12:31.640]and your gamma and XRF,

[00:12:35.030]the data that basically is coming into that index hub

[00:12:37.680]and is going through their validation workflows.

[00:12:41.540]So, then what we’re going to build is an API integration

[00:12:44.840]that’s going to let you go and fetch the data

[00:12:47.580]out of the index hub and bring it into MX Deposit

[00:12:50.610]just to kind of fill and complete the picture.

[00:12:53.670]So, we want MX Deposit to be the single source

[00:12:56.610]of all of that geoscientific data

[00:12:58.730]and so, we’re just going to start to introduce these tools

[00:13:02.210]as to how we can do that.

[00:13:03.700]And if anybody is using other service providers

[00:13:07.210]that they want us to explore potential

[00:13:09.940]integration scenarios, we’re absolutely open

[00:13:12.470]to those conversations and just put us to task

[00:13:15.440]and these conferences are great for that,

[00:13:17.430]where we can go over to the booth and introduce ourselves

[00:13:20.200]and start having those discussions.

[00:13:23.510]From a midterm perspective,

[00:13:25.770]we really want to simplify even further

[00:13:29.320]our whole sample workflow actions.

[00:13:33.030]So, we’ve already done quite a bit

[00:13:34.730]to really kind of normalize this and streamline this,

[00:13:38.330]but we feel we can do even better.

[00:13:40.880]So, we want to to take what we’ve done today,

[00:13:42.980]but we want to leverage now a lot of these known

[00:13:47.060]service schedules that are published

[00:13:48.820]and released by all the different labs out there.

[00:13:51.170]So, we’ve started to populate these global lists

[00:13:54.400]of all the different ALS schedules

[00:13:56.350]and all the different SGS methods,

[00:13:57.940]and Bureau Veritas methods.

[00:13:59.150]So, we now have these global lists

[00:14:02.410]and all the associated metadata around them.

[00:14:05.760]So, we know for all these AA suites,

[00:14:08.720]what are the different analytes they’re running

[00:14:10.430]and what are the units and what are the detection ranges

[00:14:12.870]and what are all the multi elements suites they run.

[00:14:15.330]So, we’ve done the work to kind of scrape this information

[00:14:18.540]and curate it into an easy to consume

[00:14:22.540]and an easy to search view for you as a user of MX Deposit.

[00:14:27.020]So, it really goes to the service now that we can offer you,

[00:14:30.810]and this ability to just quickly browse

[00:14:33.110]through these different labs services

[00:14:34.570]and pick and choose the ones that you were using.

[00:14:37.450]We envision getting this to the point

[00:14:39.820]that you can basically configure MX Deposit

[00:14:42.890]right off of a lab certificate.

[00:14:44.560]So, our goal here is to get you to the point

[00:14:48.210]that you could just point Deposit to an actual result file,

[00:14:52.850]and it’ll just pick out everything that it needs to

[00:14:55.280]from that file, match it up with these global lists

[00:14:58.440]and of all the service schedules

[00:15:00.690]and the configuration is now done.

[00:15:03.000]We’re going to do a similar thing with the reference material.

[00:15:07.490]So, all of the commercially available CRMs

[00:15:11.200]and blanks that are out there, we’re going to…

[00:15:15.120]I think it turned off.

[00:15:17.030]We’re going to again, curate these lists

[00:15:18.900]of everything that’s out there

[00:15:19.920]so that it’s simply a matter for you as a user of the system

[00:15:23.190]to pick and choose the ones that you’re using,

[00:15:25.440]and we’re going to help you to kind of maybe compare these.

[00:15:29.310]So, knowing what lab methods you’re running

[00:15:31.210]and knowing the parameters around that,

[00:15:34.490]let’s now browse through the standards and blanks

[00:15:36.590]and make sure that we’re choosing the appropriate ones

[00:15:38.770]to match the methods and that sort of thing.

[00:15:42.040]Similar to the work that we’re going to do

[00:15:43.580]on our export module,

[00:15:45.250]we’re going to be doing work on the import module as well.

[00:15:47.670]So again, anybody who’s using the system today knows

[00:15:50.660]that we’ve got import capabilities from a CSV file,

[00:15:55.500]but it’s got to match a certain format.

[00:15:58.140]That was our way to just get that implementation in

[00:16:00.920]so you can be using it,

[00:16:02.350]but now we’re going to take it to the next level

[00:16:04.250]and we’re always just looking at how we can improve

[00:16:07.090]on what we’ve already done.

[00:16:08.520]So, this is one of those things

[00:16:09.880]that we’re going to go back to it,

[00:16:11.520]we’re going to take a look at what’s working today,

[00:16:14.510]what maybe isn’t working today,

[00:16:15.950]what are some of the challenges that our users are having

[00:16:18.800]and how can we just make this a better experience.

[00:16:20.940]So, being able to map columns from the source file

[00:16:24.830]to Deposit and specify any other kind of import logic,

[00:16:28.560]and again, save these off as templates

[00:16:31.770]so that now you can incorporate

[00:16:33.990]and import workflow into your logging programs.

[00:16:38.490]And then something that I figured I would put here,

[00:16:40.680]which is really an ongoing thing for us

[00:16:42.670]and an ongoing priority for us

[00:16:44.910]is really just the maintenance and the improvement

[00:16:47.810]of the infrastructure.

[00:16:49.340]So, this being a hosted service means we are responsible

[00:16:54.700]for maintaining the application servers,

[00:16:57.620]the web servers, the database servers.

[00:16:59.870]And we realize that you are putting your trust in us

[00:17:03.570]to store this data and to make sure that the data is secure,

[00:17:07.330]that it’s always maintaining integrity

[00:17:09.600]and that it’s always available to you when you need it.

[00:17:11.930]So, we take this very seriously,

[00:17:14.340]so we are constantly improving the system,

[00:17:16.740]constantly finding ways to do things differently,

[00:17:20.940]if it makes sense to do it,

[00:17:22.550]and if there’s a better way to do it.

[00:17:24.780]And one of the things that we’re working with

[00:17:28.090]similar to Seequent is we’re starting to take steps

[00:17:31.730]towards this ISO 27001 Certification.

[00:17:35.400]So, really what that gets you is confidence

[00:17:38.500]that we’ve got all the appropriate controls

[00:17:41.240]and systems in place to really just lock the system down,

[00:17:45.180]make sure that only appropriate users have access

[00:17:47.880]when they should have access and everything’s audited

[00:17:50.830]and everything’s available for viewing those audit logs

[00:17:54.400]and that sort of thing.

[00:17:55.280]I mean, we’re already doing these things,

[00:17:57.200]but going through this certification process

[00:17:59.750]is just a matter of getting a third-party auditor in

[00:18:03.060]to just audit us and really just test us

[00:18:06.020]against some of these established standards.

[00:18:09.170]So, this is something that we’re after,

[00:18:11.765]it’s a big undertaking but it’s definitely part of our goals

[00:18:15.850]and something we’ll be working on an ongoing basis.

[00:18:19.690]So, that concludes what I wanted to talk about here today,

[00:18:22.610]we’ve been busy and a lot of what we have done

[00:18:26.060]and a lot of what we work on,

[00:18:27.970]is always based on customer conversations.

[00:18:30.590]That’s one of my favorite things about conferences

[00:18:32.500]like the PDAC, is this ability to get face-to-face

[00:18:36.070]and the ability to really talk to you

[00:18:37.830]about your particular challenges

[00:18:39.730]and some of the drilling programs

[00:18:41.140]or field sampling programs that you’ve got coming up

[00:18:44.310]or how are your current systems failing you.

[00:18:46.470]So, these are the conversations

[00:18:48.830]that I’m always open to having,

[00:18:51.420]we’re always looking on how we can improve what we’re doing

[00:18:54.260]and how we can just solve your problems

[00:18:56.907]and just help you within your business

[00:19:00.020]and realize more value for your investment.

[00:19:03.300]So, thank you very much.

[00:19:04.330]I hope everybody enjoys the rest of the show.

[00:19:06.420]And please come talk to us either here at the Seequent booth

[00:19:09.270]or over at the corner at a booth 350.

[00:19:12.490]So, thank you very much.