The South African arm of Germany-based metallurgical plant and rolling-mill technology provider SMS has developed strategies for advancing digitalisation in the steel industry.

It is assisting several clients in understanding the efficiencies and competitive advantage that embracing a digitalisation strategy can add to their operations, product quality and total cost of ownership, notes SMS group MD Pieter Bezuidenhout.

The company has been increasing its client support activities throughout the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region. “We also provide support for our colleagues for the Kenyan market; this is an exciting growth phase for us and we will continue to increase these activities over the next few years,” he tells Engineering News.

As the SADC and Kenyan regional markets improve their metals processing technology, increase localisation of product supply, efficiency and product yield, while decreasing total cost of ownership, the SMS group is best positioned as a technology partner for these markets, he adds.

SMS group key accounts manager Manshil Singh states that SMS group is working on several project opportunities spanning various market segments of the company in the SADC region, including ironmaking, steelmaking, casting, secondary metallurgy, rolling mills for flat and long products, extrusion plants and forging plants. The company is working on several modernisation and upgrade projects, he concludes.