Breaking Ground: The Evolution of Mining Equipment with Caterpillar

How did a company inspired by caterpillars morph into a leader in autonomous mining? Denise Johnson, Group President of Resource Industries at Caterpillar, digs into the company's legacy and how it's making the mining industry smarter, safer, and more sustainable. 🚧 🐛

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Transcript

(0:00) Welcome to the Tomorrow's World Today podcast. We sit down with experts, world-changing innovators, (0:06) creators, and makers to explore how they're taking action to make tomorrow's world a better (0:11) place for technology, science, innovation, sustainability, the arts, and more. In this (0:18) episode, George Davison, who is also the host of Tomorrow's World Today on Science, sits down with (0:23) Caterpillar Group President Denise Johnson to explore the cutting-edge innovations shaping (0:28) the future of construction and mining.
Denise reveals how technology is revolutionizing (0:34) efficiency in these industries. Hi, Denise. Hello, George.
It's great to be here. Wow, it's fun to (0:40) have you here today. We have a lot of questions in store for our audience today.
Maybe we can (0:45) start with a little bit of the history of the Caterpillar Corporation, and can you tell us (0:50) how it was founded? Absolutely. It really is an interesting story. Caterpillar has been around (0:56) for a long time, in fact, almost 100 years.
Think about back 100 years ago when there was a lot of (1:03) work that needed to be done. It leveraged largely horses or cows pulling different pieces of (1:09) equipment to be able to either move materials or to really allow farming to be done. All of (1:18) that was done very manually.
So at that time, there were two pioneers, two entrepreneurs that (1:25) thought there has to be a way to make this more reliable, to make the whole process (1:30) be able to be leveraged in a way that took a lot of time and energy and didn't involve livestock. (1:37) So they started experimenting with steam engines and attaching steam engines to tractors (1:43) and trailers and pulling those trailers with a steam engine. So two entrepreneurs, (1:50) CL Best and Benjamin Holt, were in this space and they were working largely on the same kind (1:56) of equipment.
And the two of them decided, hey, I think we could work together as a team and with (2:03) our abilities together, we could do even more. And so they worked together and formed a company (2:11) and they called it Caterpillar. And there's an interesting story behind the name Caterpillar.
(2:15) Oh, please share it. (2:17) Okay. Well, as they moved in and started to develop the product, they actually were demonstrating it (2:25) to a set of photographers and showing them how effective this this tractor was in moving (2:32) equipment and goods across the field.
And one of the photographers looked at it and said, you know, (2:38) that tractor moves like a caterpillar and the name stuck. And so they became Caterpillar after that. (2:47) That is so interesting.
So we have two entrepreneurs looking at a frontier that (2:53) they were trying to improve. And that was the launch. They combined their energies and (2:59) now a new name is formed by outsiders using their observational skills and saying, wow, (3:06) it looks like it moves like a caterpillar.
And wow, isn't that interesting? Because (3:11) observational skills are so critically important in the field of innovation, isn't it? (3:17) They really are. They're what sparks, I think, not only the ideas, (3:21) but they also actually help people to be able to quantify the problems such that they know what (3:27) they have to solve and what they need to change to make it better. And that makes all the difference.
(3:32) Well, that's interesting. Your background is in engineering, isn't it? (3:35) It is. Would you say that part of engineering is doing a lot of, let's say, analysis of (3:45) problems that exist and then looking at them instead of as a problem as an opportunity? (3:51) I think the basis of engineering is curiosity.
It's really understanding how and why things (3:58) happen. And it's a skill that can be learned. I know that I didn't, as a young child, (4:04) know that I wanted to be an engineer.
I actually discovered that over time. (4:08) Yes. And can you share a little of that discovery? How did you find that (4:14) math and science, engineering, that kind of thing existed in you? Did somebody inspire you? (4:21) Well, in fact, I was good in math and science, and I had a number of teachers and even people that I (4:28) knew that were friends that said, you know, maybe you should become an engineer.
And at the time, (4:33) I had no idea in my mind what an engineer was. I'd never seen an engineer at work. I never (4:39) knew an engineer or what they did.
And it was hard for me to picture it. You know, (4:44) when you think about a teacher or a doctor or a nurse or a fireman, you know what they do. (4:50) Yes.
Engineering is a little more elusive. It's not as direct to understand what they do. So (4:57) after that suggestion, I set out and really job shadowed or went to work with an engineer, (5:04) actually sat by them at their desk and tried to understand what do they do.
(5:08) And what I found is engineers do a lot more hands-on problem solving than I ever imagined. (5:15) And the more that I watched, the more that I saw what that the engineering field was about, (5:20) the more that I was intrigued by it and got involved. (5:22) Well, what a wonderful way to get started.
And maybe that's a good segue into how you (5:29) did get your career started. You had an interest in math. Eventually, you went off into some (5:36) direction, off to an additional school, and then you got a job somewhere.
(5:41) Absolutely. You know, I think there's so many things that there's so many ways that you can move (5:46) and actually explore what you're interested in in the world. The thing about choosing a career is (5:53) it's not always a direct correlation.
So as you think about being an engineer, and as I thought (5:58) about being an engineer, it took a lot of experimentation for me to find that that's (6:04) really what I wanted to do. Talking to people, understanding what the roles were, and then (6:09) getting in and trying it myself before I knew that's what I wanted to do. And the path that you (6:14) think you're going to go on is never the path that ends up being the one you take.
(6:18) There's a lot that happens in your life, and you have to be flexible. (6:22) Yes. Well, that's a wonderful way to talk about it.
Would you walk us, you weren't always the (6:29) president of Caterpillar Corporation, and it's wonderful. I think you're going to inspire a lot (6:34) of people out there with your story. Your work career, can you walk us through a little bit of (6:40) that? Tell us a little, like what life has been like as you've marched forward on this journey? (6:46) Absolutely.
So I was a summer intern when I was attending college at General Motors. So I worked (6:52) for an automotive manufacturer in my career. And as I initially graduated from college, (6:59) I was a test engineer.
So I used to test steering systems. So we know that steer your car. I used (7:05) to have to go into the lab and then actually on the vehicle, and we would do the testing to make (7:10) sure that those components, those parts were going to be robust and last for a long time.
(7:16) So that was the first job I had. And it was a really interesting job because you learn how (7:20) things fail, how things break. You're given some assignments as a studying engineer to teach you (7:28) some of the concepts around what you would do in the long run.
And at the time I was an intern, (7:34) it was a summer job that really focused on helping the engineers get their work done. So (7:40) it was a great opportunity. At that time, we were doing air conditioning systems.
So you think about (7:45) cooling someone in a car. I was helping an engineer that was trying to design, how do we make the (7:51) temperature in the car be even lower so that when people get in, they can cool off very quickly? (7:57) Interesting. So I went from engineering into manufacturing and then was in a more general (8:04) management role.
And I think that's the other thing about the field of engineering that I love (8:08) is it can take you into many different career paths. And so after about 20 years of working (8:14) at General Motors, I actually moved over to work for Caterpillar. And when I initially moved into (8:20) Caterpillar, it was on engineering and designing components again.
So I went back to my roots of (8:25) design and engineering and then moved up from there and have had the opportunity to move into (8:31) a variety of positions within Caterpillar. Or now I'm leading resource industries, which is (8:37) responsible for producing mining equipment and large construction equipment for mining and (8:43) construction customers. So it's a really neat area.
And we also do a lot in the area of technology. (8:49) And one of the interesting technologies that we're working on right now is self-driving tractors and (8:54) self-driving mining equipment. And so that's a really exciting field to be a part of.
(8:59) Well, that's exciting. And let's talk some more about that, shall we? (9:03) Absolutely. (9:05) Innovation at the Caterpillar Corporation and what the world looks like in the future.
(9:11) Well, you know, there's so much happening in the world today. And what you see around you every (9:16) day is what's happening in the fields like construction and mining. So, you know, the (9:22) whole idea of a digital thread that helps to make the operation of a piece of equipment go (9:30) smoother and easier.
So things like if I'm a brand new technician and I'm getting into an operator, (9:37) I'm getting into a piece of equipment, there's capability now within our machines so that you (9:41) don't have to have six months of training to be able to dig a deep hole, that the machine itself (9:48) has some assist that help you to do that task very easily. And so someone who doesn't have a (9:54) lot of experience with that task can go in and with a very short introduction can actually do (10:03) the task very easily. So it's a mechanism to really enable faster, easier operation of equipment.
(10:11) That's wonderful. So simplification is important from a technology perspective, (10:16) right? So if we can make it more simple, you can attract all sorts of different people to (10:21) work with in the future. Less training is required.
Of course, we always make investments in our (10:27) people. But it's also important to keep them safe and keep them moving, right? (10:32) Absolutely. And safety and productivity are two of the biggest things that that we try to (10:37) try to really enable within our equipment.
And it's an exciting place to be. (10:41) So some of the people here were out at your headquarters, and they were able to get on (10:47) some of these trucks. Some of them are five stories high.
That's taller than a lot of (10:51) buildings in our city. It is. These trucks are amazing.
And they can carry, you know, (10:56) up to 400 tons of material. So, you know, a lot of dirt is being moved. And they're amazing (11:02) pieces of equipment.
And is there always a human being in them? (11:07) Well, that's the really interesting part. You know, as I talked about the technology of helping (11:11) an operator, that's one of the easier ways that we have leveraged technology. But we actually have (11:17) self-driving large mining trucks that, you know, we have over 100 in one mine site alone, (11:23) where they're driving autonomously.
And they're doing it in a way that allows them (11:27) to work more efficiently than if they had manned people in them, per se. Because you're moving them (11:33) as a system, almost like a factory. And that makes it really compelling to be able to operate (11:39) much more efficiently and think about the safety impact.
Yes. There's no one that's going to be (11:43) injured when you don't have someone in a truck. I see.
So you have a lot of these trucks running (11:48) around. No human beings to be hurt that can't be seen from five stories up. Is that a fair way (11:54) to say it? That's a fair way to say it.
And everywhere around the world, what's really (11:58) great is this is a global deployment. So we have, you know, we have them in every, (12:03) almost every continent of the world. Isn't it interesting? We've gone from pulling devices (12:08) to plow fields with a steam engine back in the old days, to, you know, new machines with all sorts of (12:17) battery technology moving into your equipment.
You have AI, you have roboticism, everything is moving (12:24) in this direction. And it's over how many years is this? This isn't that long of a period of time, (12:29) is it? Well, not in the big scheme of things. I mean, if you think about autonomy, we started (12:34) investing in that in the 1985 timeframe.
So, you know, you think about it, it's 35, 40 years ago (12:41) that we started to invest in the technology. And now, 40 years later, it's really here and it's (12:47) happening. But we've had a lot of experimentation.
You know, technology is something that you have (12:53) to continue to invest in and you learn and the ability of integrating it and pulling it all (12:59) together changes. And so I think, you know, it's an evolving, it's an evolving thing, but it takes (13:06) time for it to really manifest itself into, you know, something that's actually commercializable. (13:13) Yes.
Would you say that a part of making that future innovative world happen, we need a lot of (13:21) STEM? Absolutely. At Caterpillar, we have over 10,000 engineers. So and we have almost 1000 PhDs.
(13:30) So when you think about, and they're all from all sorts of disciplines, so it's not all in (13:35) software or robotics, there's, you know, we need people who really are interested in wanting to (13:42) help us and it can be everything from technicians who are actually working on our equipment, (13:47) all the way to, you know, software engineers. So we need a wide range of backgrounds. And not (13:53) everyone has to be an engineer to be involved with the product development cycle.
So do you (13:58) believe anybody can be successful in this world today? I absolutely believe that anyone can be (14:05) successful. And I think part of it is what defines success, right? I think for me, it isn't about (14:11) position, it isn't about income, it's not about, it's not about status or power, it's about making (14:19) a difference. And success in in that way, can have a very broad definition, but it is about (14:27) making the world a better place.
Yes, wherever you are, and whatever you do. And you know what, (14:33) there's a long history of that at Caterpillar isn't, you know, looking at the whole company (14:37) started at trying to make farming better, and improve human existence on this planet. (14:44) And here we are today, still trying to make the work less work, and to make life better for (14:50) everybody.
So it's, it's nice to nice to think that way and to work that way. It is. And you know, (14:56) our company is an infrastructure company, which means we help build the foundation for what makes (15:00) communities grow.
So whether it's the ability to be able to gain access to water, or whether it's (15:06) building bridges and roads, or whether it's helping with energy and power, you know, all of (15:11) that is needed to help the world be able to foundationally grow. And so it's so exciting to (15:15) be a part of a company that that has that as its mission. Well, how difficult it is today to be (15:23) able to find the skills needed for the workforce that you're looking for for the future? Are you (15:29) are you finding that you're getting a lot of candidates with the skills that you're looking (15:34) for? Well, you know, there's always an opportunity to get more, I would say, you know, certainly, (15:40) we target, we target a broad range of backgrounds.
And we're really looking for diversity of (15:47) candidates. So whether it's a background in, in math and science, or whether it's someone who's (15:53) really good at communications, or whether it's someone that really is excited about, you know, (15:59) marketing or finance, or, you know, even human relations, and we're looking for the best and (16:05) the brightest in each one of the categories. And I think that's what's great about a big company (16:09) like Caterpillar.
It's you don't have to only be interested in one thing, you can have a lot of (16:15) different kinds of backgrounds. And we need we need good people, we need people who really are (16:20) passionate, who want to improve, and they really want to be a part of a company like Caterpillar (16:26) that's an innovator for the future. And you know, we're a global business.
So we have people all (16:30) around the world. And that's exciting, too. Well, that's interesting.
I, because I think we could (16:34) maybe put it in two different baskets. We, we have a world of hard skills and a world of soft (16:40) skills, and you just touched on both. So we have, let's say, hands on manufacturing and engineering.
(16:46) And that that's one basket. And the other, it's the soft social skills, the, you know, (16:53) being able to work with your teammates and showing up to work on time and wanting to make a (16:59) contribution, would you say, if we could look at those two baskets, is that fair to say that's the (17:05) way you're looking at it at Caterpillar? Absolutely. And we're looking for people who have the ability (17:09) to be able to do a little bit of both as well, right.
So if you're an engineer, that's great, (17:13) you have a very strong technical skill. But if you can't work in a team, because a lot of the work (17:18) that we do is in a team function. Yeah, you need both soft skills and hard skills.
So I do think, (17:24) you know, you bring up a good point. And I think what's really great about the ability to be able (17:30) to join a company like Caterpillar is you can move from a position like an engineer and in work in a (17:37) in an office environment. And if you're really interested in manufacturing, you can move that (17:41) skill and become a manufacturing engineer and move into a factory environment.
So there's a lot of (17:45) different positions that you can move into. So if you decide I want to try something new, (17:50) the company supports that. And it's a really that really, I think, enables people to, you know, (17:55) change as they grow and really change their interests as well.
That's wonderful. You're (18:00) living proof of it. You've moved through that organization right on up the ladder, haven't you? (18:04) Yes, I have.
I've been very lucky to be able to do that and worked very hard as well. (18:08) Yes. And that I think that's a big piece of it.
If you have the soft skills and the hard skills, (18:14) and you're willing to put the effort in, the future is yours. (18:18) There's no better way, I think, to succeed than to apply yourself and to work hard, (18:23) but and to never give up. And it's easy when things happen that maybe don't go your way, (18:28) and you don't get the position that you wanted, or you have a project that doesn't do well, (18:34) but you have to learn from those failures.
Everyone fails. And if you can learn from (18:39) those failures, and you can grow from those failures, you are going to be a much, much (18:45) better person for it. And if you don't give up, you will succeed in the long run.
(18:50) That's so true. Yeah, Thomas Edison, he went after what he had a thousand failed experiments (18:56) before he figured out how to give us a light bulb. And so we refer to that here to Inventionland is (19:01) learn how to fail your way forward.
(19:03) That's right. And not take it personally. I think so many people (19:07) think that it's a reflection on them.
You have to take your personality out of it. It's not (19:12) about you. If something you've done necessarily doesn't go right, it doesn't mean that you've (19:17) failed.
It means that what that project was wasn't successful. You have to figure out why, (19:22) what happened, what could you do differently, and then try again. And if you don't give up, (19:27) you'll succeed eventually.
(19:28) I agree with that wholeheartedly. And I think that's a great life too. It makes it interesting.
(19:34) So do you have any closing thoughts or comments you'd like to share with the audience today? (19:41) Well, you know, as I think back, and certainly I've been working for over 30 years, (19:46) I think one of the things that I resonate that resonates with me is (19:50) sometimes you have to step back in order to move forward. It's that whole idea of growing as you (19:57) learn. And making mistakes or sometimes even changing course is not a bad thing.
The most (20:05) important thing you can do is to learn from anything that you're doing and let that carry (20:12) you forward. So that would be my main message today. And I guess the final thing is never give (20:17) up.
(20:17) Those are great messages. And I can't thank you enough for sharing that with our audience today. (20:22) Well, thank you.
(20:24) Thank you. (20:24) And to our audience, thank you for tuning in. (20:28) Bye, everybody.
(20:30) Thank you for listening to this episode of Tomorrow's World Today podcast. Join us next (20:34) time as we continue to explore the worlds of inspiration, creation, innovation and production. (20:40) Discover more at tomorrowsworldtoday.com. Connect with us on social media at TWT Explore (20:45) and find us wherever podcasts are available.