Orica - Company Profile

Company Profile

Orica is an Australian-owned, publicly-listed global company with operations in around 50 countries and customers in twice that many.

We have evolved from a supplier of explosives to the Victorian gold fields in 19^th Century Australia into a multi-billion dollar company that is currently ranked as one of the top 30 companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange based on market capitalisation.

Orica’s proud traditions of leadership, innovation, quality and safety are shared by our 13,000 people located in around 50 countries across six continents.

Orica turns science into the solutions that satisfy basic human needs. Our products, brands and services can be trusted for their reliability, range and quality. Each of our businesses – Orica Mining Services, Minova and Orica Chemicals - is the leader in its chosen market.

Orica Mining Services offers commercial explosives, initiating systems and Blast-Based Services to the mining, quarrying and construction industries. The business is run globally with a presence in Australia, Asia, Europe, the former Soviet Union, Africa, the Middle East, North America and Latin America. The recently-completed acquisition of parts of Dyno Nobel’s commercial explosives business is highly complementary to Orica’s Mining Services operations and provides significant opportunities for synergy and growth.

Orica Chemicals is a leading manufacturer, trader and distributor of chemicals and services for customers in industrial, mining, pulp and paper, water treatment, construction, dairy, food and beverage and agriculture markets. The group has six business units: Mining Chemicals, Chemicals Australia, Chemnet New Zealand, Orica Chemicals Latin America, Bronson & Jacobs and Marplex. The group has a strong portfolio of manufacturing and distribution assets strategically located across Australia, New Zealand, Asia, Latin America and Africa which enables it to provide valuable supply chain capabilities for its customers.

Minova is a leading manufacturer and supplier of chemical-based consumables, steel bolts, application and drilling equipment and services associated with rock bolting, ground consolidation, ventilation and water control in the underground mining, tunneling and civil engineering industries. The business provides both proprietary and custom-engineered applications and services based on over thirty five years of accumulated experience in the fields of underground strata and ventilation control.

Orica’s business activities are guided by our three pillars:

Strategy - planning for business growth
Efficiency – productivity improvements and capital management
Culture – having common attitudes, behaviours and ethics.

Underpinning the three pillars of Strategy, Efficiency and Culture are Orica’s value drivers:

Organic growth, mergers and acquisitions
Cost productivity (reducing the total costs incurred for each dollar gross margin of sales)
Capital productivity (reducing the amount of fixed and working capital required to produce each dollar of sales)
The four ‘Deliver the Promise’ principles supporting our performance-based culture and against which our performance is measured. These principles - Safety, Health and the Environment, Commercial Ownership, Creative Customer Solutions and Working Together – are all supported by appropriate systems and processes. Our culture empowers and motivates our people to achieve long-term, sustainable results.

At Orica, we care about people and the environment. We acknowledge our environmental, social and community obligations. Meeting those obligations is important to us, our customers and the community, and contributes to our aim to conduct our business in a sustainable manner.

Orica’s commitment to Safety, Health and the Environment (SH&E) is well recognised and our underlying progress in improving our SH&E performance is good in many areas. Our ultimate goal is to eliminate all work-related injuries, illnesses, motor vehicle incidents, environmental incidents, waste complaints and other adverse SH&E incidents Our progress towards this goal is measured annually against challenging five-year improvement milestones known as our Challenge program. By striving to meet these safety, health and environment objectives we move closer to making Orica a safer and better place to work and one that minimises impact on the environment and the community.

Orica is progressively cleaning up legacy issues that have resulted from past manufacturing practices. In recent years remediation work has been completed at a number of sites and the Botany Groundwater Treatment Plant is now being successfully commissioned. Addressing legacy issues is challenging and takes time, however we are committed to cooperating with regulatory authorities and the community to achieve the required results.

At Orica, we believe that responsible corporate practices will not only benefit society, but will also enhance our financial performance.