Company: RUNGE MINING

State: QUEENSLAND

Sector: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

Runge Mining is a Brisbane based firm providing business oriented mine
planning services. Runge provides consulting services to assist mines
achieve higher returns through economically focussed mine planning. They
also develop and sell software for mine planning, optimisation, management
decision support and financial analysis. Runge has overseas representative
offices in the United States, Canada, Chile and South Africa.

In the late 1990s, Runge explored opportunities in the Indian market,
but this effort met with little success. However, after further approaches
from Indian contacts and gaining in-house knowledge of the market, they
again assessed the Indian market in 2000. Contacts made on a trade mission
in early 2000 led to an opportunity to tender for a mining software
project, which is currently in development. Runge personnel also visited
and established an alliance with SRG, an Indian mining engineering
consulting group based in Kolkatta (West Bengal). Runge believe SRG have
the skills and expertise to offer comprehensive support for Runge' s
software products in this region.

While positive about their Indian future, Runge notes the differences
in business culture and operating environment. It recognises
infrastructure difficulties and cultural differences can make doing
business very time consuming. The bureaucratic and hierarchical nature of
most firms, difficulty in obtaining decisions and an occasional lack of
transparency in business dealings are further problems. However, Runge
believes patience and commitment overcome most of these issues.

Source: Runge Mining, 2001.