Ideon Technologies has announced what it says is a landmark, five-year enterprise partnership with Rio Tinto focused on addressing mining’s hardest problem – geological uncertainty.
Ideon will apply its proprietary REVEAL™ subsurface intelligence platform to support Rio Tinto’s strategic efforts to unlock value across a range of different use cases and commodities (including copper and iron ore), while advancing its vision for the mine of the future. These efforts will build on current investments in Remote Operations Centres (ROCs) and automation to drive operational performance, reduce costs and uphold the highest safety standards, it says.
The Ideon REVEAL Platform combines the power of cosmic-ray muons — subatomic particles created by supernova explosions in space — with advanced geophysical sensing technologies, multi-physics data integration and AI-powered services. It generates high-resolution, high-velocity, 3D models of the Earth’s subsurface, enabling mining companies to identify, map, characterise, monitor and extract orebodies faster, more efficiently and with greater confidence. This results in faster targeting, shorter development timelines, reduced operational risk and a smaller environmental footprint, according to the company.
This partnership represents the first global-scale adoption of the Ideon REVEAL Platform by a Tier 1 mining company, Ideon says. The initial phase of the global rollout spans six of Rio Tinto’s largest operations across multiple continents, addressing a range of high-value operational challenges across the entire exploration and mining value chain.
Today’s announcement builds on several years of collaboration between the two companies, including a successful deployment at Bingham Canyon. There, Ideon muon-based imaging technology enhanced geological models, reconciled production tonnage and provided a robust decision-making tool for operational planning, according to the company.
“Global demand for critical minerals is surging, driven by the need for energy resilience, rapid expansion of AI infrastructure and geopolitical imperatives around security of supply,” Gary Agnew, Co-Founder & CEO of Ideon Technologies, said. “Yet the way we map and recover these resources hasn’t fundamentally changed in decades. The $12 trillion gap in critical mineral supply cannot be closed through incremental improvement. It requires the application of breakthrough technologies, bold leadership and disciplined execution. Rio Tinto is demonstrating all three.
“Our partnership goes far beyond technology trials; it’s about unlocking the future of mining through real enterprise integration that improves productivity, reduces cost and increases confidence. By embedding our platform directly into Rio Tinto operations, we’re helping to re-engineer workflows, enabling faster, high confidence exploration and mining decisions. This is how long-term value will be generated in critical mineral exploration and development – scalable, intelligent and highly integrated.”
