4Sight buys mining software specialist

4Sight Holdings said on Friday it would acquire BluESP, an engineering technology company that focuses on providing software solutions to the mining and manufacturing sectors, for R54.8m, payable in both shares and cash.

The share portion will be worth R35m, while the cash portion is R19.8m.

4Sight’s share price climbed 6.38% on Friday to close at R2.50. 4Sight Holdings, which owns a data business, listed on the JSE’s Alternative Exchange on Thursday, making it the first tech listing in almost three years.

BlueESP said its solutions enabled companies to operate their processing plants or manufacturing processes optimally, maximising revenues, eliminating inefficiencies and minimising costs.

“These improvements are achieved by collecting data from sensors, equipment and IOT [internet of things] devices across an entire site and between multiple sites. The data is stored in a real-time data warehouse from where it can be analysed and visualised,” the company said.

Further value was added through its manufacturing execution system layer, an information system designed and implemented according to the customer’s business processes and fully integrated with its enterprise resource planning suite.

“Enterprise operations reporting systems give management enterprise-wide visibility of their operations,” it said.

BluESP is based in Jukskei Park and its products have been deployed across the world by the BluESP team.

BlueESP’s local customers include Sasol, Columbus Stainless, Anglo-American, Glencore, Impala Platinum, Lonmin, Samancor, Tharisa, Tronox, South32, Chevron, ArcelorMittal, Natref and Kynoch.

Global customers include First Quantum Minerals of Zambia, Mount Isa Mines of Australia, Sekura of Malaysia, GS Caltex of South Korea.