At Codelco, maintenance represents 28% of operational costs and the SOMA (Maintenance Operating System) is the corporate tool that seeks to standardize tasks in the area and make the business sustainable. To accelerate its application throughout El Teniente, 60 workers from collaborating companies were trained to level up their knowledge of the system.

Daniela Marín, head of the Mine Maintenance Planning Unit, explained that “these workshops are focused on collaborating companies because we must all face Codelco’s challenges together and SOMA must include all of us who work in maintenance. The idea is that they join the changes we are making and we accelerate actions to face the challenges we have as a corporation and at El Teniente.”

Seven partner companies working in the open pit, sewell, mine and plant sectors are participating in the sessions, which are held at the training center located in Codelco's Rancagua Yard. "There are workers in different roles, both in planning and execution, and they are essential to expanding the system and the planning cycle," said Marín.

Juan Pincheira, Mine Maintenance Manager, explained that “we have a great opportunity to boost the company’s results by working with the maintenance team. One of the most important contributions to our processes has to do with planning management and that is why we bring together the maintenance teams from the largest partner companies to train them and make them all understand the same language.”

“We are holding the necessary meetings, providing information and seeing what the critical points are. With this workshop, I feel that we are on a better path. It is important to know how SOMA works and to support each other,” said Raúl Morales, a planner at the Santa Elvira company.

Yerko Torres, a reliability engineer at Ferrostal, highlighted the event. “I found the process to be excellent because it requires a lot of attention and training. The concepts are clear and specific, which is what is important, and it is clear that there are people who have already applied them.”

“We share experiences with other companies and unify criteria. The speakers are very specialized because all areas have different processes and are managed differently. So it is important that these criteria are defined based on our realities. It has been very beneficial for our team,” added Maximiliano Pérez, from the Mies company.