CTRM Subject Matter Expert

DAMCO SOLUTIONS INC.

CTRM Subject Matter Expert — Role Profile

Metals & Minerals Trading, with Inventory & Warehouse Management expertise

Part-time advisory role supporting a Damco client modernization engagement · Remote

1. Role context

• Damco is delivering a legacy modernization engagement for a client in the metals & minerals tradingsector. The client operates a home-grown ERP/CTRM system on IBM i (AS/400), supporting a trading business with significant physical inventory and warehouse operations. The engagement assesses the system's data architecture and validates a phased modernization approach through a working proof of concept.
• We are looking for an industry SME with real operational experience in metals & minerals trading to validate data models, identify business-process gaps, and recommend improvements beyond current system capabilities. The role bridges the client's trading and inventory operations and Damco's data architects: our architects can document how the system works, but only a domain expert can confirm whether the data model reflects how the physical commodity trade and inventory actually behave — and where the legacy system holds the business back.

The kind of environment you'll be working on

• The client runs a home-grown, custom-built CTRM — not a packaged vendor platform. You'll need to reason about trading concepts independent of any one tool and map them onto a bespoke model.
• Typical issues you should recognize immediately from real trading operations: product master problems (the same product carried under multiple numbers, invoicing constraints), lot data with chemical composition encoded as symbols, hard field-length ceilings on contract numbering, risk and position reporting run through spreadsheet exports rather than the system, and no real-time hedging or currency visibility.
• This is a metals & minerals trading business with heavy physical inventory and warehouse operations — trade-lifecycle depth and inventory/warehouse depth matter equally.

2. Nature of the role & time commitment

This is not a full-time or dedicated role. It is an advisory engagement designed to draw on senior domain expertise at the points where it matters most, without requiring day-to-day involvement.

• A few hours per week — typically concentrated around data-model reviews, validation checkpoints, and gap-analysis sessions.
• D rawn from a small agreed monthly bucket of hours,used flexibly as the engagement requires rather than on a fixed daily schedule.
• Effort is heaviest during the data architecture and entity-mapping phase, and again at gap analysis and roadmap stage; lighter at other times.
• Fully remote, with sessions scheduled around the engagement's checkpoints. Suits an experienced practitioner or consultant working alongside other commitments.
• Potential to extend into subsequent modernization phases if the engagement progresses.

3. What you'll do

Within the discovery and proof of concept, you own the business-validation thread:

• Validate the canonical data modelfor the selected module (e.g., product / lot) against real metals-trading semantics — material grades, assays and quality specs, lot and heat identification, units of measure and conversions, and inventory states.
• Map the physical and contractual trade lifecycle — sourcing/procurement, logistics and warehouse movements, weights and measures, title and risk transfer, hedging exposure, and settlement — onto the client's modules to surface gaps.
• Assess inventory & warehouse management— receipts, put-away, location and bin management, lot traceability, stock reconciliation, shrinkage/loss, and physical-vs-book positions — against current system capabilities.
• Identify process improvements the current system cannot support, feeding the modernization roadmap with prioritized, business-justified recommendations.
• Advise on proof-of-concept module selection — which module offers the clearest business value and the cleanest validation of the coexistence approach.

4. Required domain expertise

Commodity trading & risk management (CTRM)

• Hands-on experience with CTRM/ETRM systemsfor physical commodities — trade capture, position management, physical logistics, and settlement workflows.
• Deep understanding of the physical commodity trade lifecycle: procurement, contracts, pricing (including formula/index pricing and premiums), logistics, invoicing, and settlement.
• Familiarity with mark-to-market, position and exposure tracking, and the basics of hedging for physical trading books.
• Understanding of trade documentation and title/risk transfer (Incoterms, warehouse receipts, bills of lading, certificates of analysis).

Metals & minerals trading (primary domain)

• Direct operational experience in metals & minerals trading— base or precious metals, ferrous/non-ferrous, ferroalloys, concentrates, ores, or minerals.
• Familiarity with metals-specific concepts: grades and assays, quality/spec tolerances, lot and heat tracking, provisional vs final pricing and weights, quotational periods, and treatment/refining charges (TC/RCs) where relevant.
• Understanding of exchange and pricing references relevant to metals (e.g., LME-type benchmarks) and how they flow into trade and inventory valuation.

Inventory & warehouse management (strong secondary focus)

• Operational expertise in inventory and warehouse managementfor physical commodities — receipts, put-away, location/bin management, and dispatch.
• Lot and batch traceability, serial/heat tracking, and units-of-measure handling (including conversions between traded, stored, and invoiced units).
• Stock reconciliation, cycle counting, shrinkage and loss handling, and reconciliation of physical vs book positions.
• Familiarity with warehouse receipts, third-party/bonded warehousing, and in-transit inventory.

5. CTRM platform & tooling experience

Because the client runs a custom-built CTRM, the ideal SME has seen how the leading commercial platforms model the same problems — that pattern knowledge is exactly what tells us whether a bespoke model is sound or missing something. Hands-on experience with one or more of the platforms below is expected; the metals/physical-focused tier is the most directly relevant.

Tier 1 — Metals, minerals & physical-commodity focused (most relevant)

• Eka / Quoreka — commodity management across metals & mining.
• Fendahl Fusion— CTRM purpose-built for metals and metal concentrates (base, refined, ferrous, non-ferrous, scrap).
• ION Triple Point (CommodityXL)— widely used for metals and concentrates trading and risk.
• Brady — established metals and recycling/scrap trading and risk platform.
• Commodities Engineering (BALSAMO) — raw materials, concentrates, refined and scrap metals; trading, logistics and financing.
• CTRM Next — dedicated base/precious-metals and concentrates capabilities (LME mechanics, warehouse, blending).

Tier 2 — Broad market-leading CTRM/ETRM platforms (valuable general pattern experience)

The commercial CTRM market is heavily consolidated under ION, which owns several of the historic top platforms. Experience with any of these demonstrates enterprise-grade trade-lifecycle and risk fluency:

• ION Openlink (Endur), ION RightAngle, ION Allegro (Horizon), ION Aspect — the ION family of enterprise CTRMs.
• Other notable platforms: Molecule, Quor, Agiblocks, SAP S/4HANA Commodity Management, and FIS commodity solutions.

How to read the tooling requirement

• Tier 1 experience (metals/physical) is the strongest signal — it maps most directly onto grades, lots, concentrates, warehousing and provisional-pricing reality.
• Tier 2 experience is valuable for enterprise trade-lifecycle and risk pattern knowledge, even if the commodity differs.
• Names are indicative, not a checklist — depth of real trading-operations experience matters more than any single badge. An SME who has run operations on one strong metals platform and understands the concepts portably is a better fit than one who has only lightly touched several.

Custom / bespoke CTRM build experience (strong plus)

• Highly relevant: experience designing, specifying, or heavily configuring a home-grown or bespoke CTRM — not just using a packaged product — since the client's system is custom-built and the roadmap points toward a custom, module-by-module (strangler-pattern) rebuild.
• Ability to translate trading requirements into data-model and business-rule specifications a build team can implement.
• Having lived through at least one CTRM implementation, migration, or major re-platforming — and able to speak to what makes them succeed or fail.

6. Data & modernization fluency

You don't need to be an engineer, but you must be able to work fluently with data architects:

• Comfortable reviewing and critiquing data models — entities, attributes, relationships, and reference/master data — from a business-correctness standpoint.
• Able to translate trading and inventory operations into data-model requirements and business rules.
• Helpful (not mandatory): exposure to legacy ERP modernization, IBM i / AS-400 environments, or master-data and canonical-model design.
• Able to distinguish system limitations from process choices — knowing which gaps are technology-driven and which are operational.

7. Engagement & communication skills

• Strong stakeholder-facing skills — credible with both business/trading staff and a technical delivery team.
• Able to run and document structured discovery sessions, and to distill findings into clear, prioritized recommendations.
• Comfortable in a remote, time-boxed advisory engagement with a fast discovery cadence.
• Precise and business-justified in recommendations — every proposed improvement tied to a clear operational or commercial benefit.

8. Contribution to deliverables

Your work feeds directly into the engagement deliverables:

• Assessment report— the business-process and data-model validation sections, and the catalogue of identified gaps.
• Modernization roadmap— the business-process re-engineering recommendations and their prioritization.
• Proof of concept— sign-off that the canonical data model for the selected module is business-correct for metals & minerals trading and inventory.

9. Ideal profile at a glance

The person we're looking for

• A metals & minerals trading professional — from a trading house, producer, or CTRM/commodity-software background — who has lived inside the physical trade and inventory operations, not just the front-office trading screen.
• Has hands-on depth in at least one leading metals/physical CTRM (e.g., Eka/Quoreka, Fendahl Fusion, ION Triple Point, Brady) and understands the concepts portably — ideally with exposure to a custom or bespoke CTRM build.
• Someone who has seen how grades, lots, weights, warehouse movements, and provisional pricing really behave, and can spot when a data model or process quietly assumes something the business doesn't do.
• Comfortable sitting between a trading floor and a data architect, and able to turn 'how the business actually works' into requirements a modernization team can build against.
• Available on a part-time advisory basis — a few hours a week — rather than seeking a full-time position.

Damco Solutions Inc. — role profile for a part-time CTRM subject matter expert supporting a client modernization engagement. Client details are confidential and will be shared with shortlisted candidates under NDA.