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| March 10, 2010 Value Added: Resinco Technical Advisory Board | |||||
In order to deliver more value to its shareholders, Resinco Capital Partners ("Resinco") has assembled a Technical Advisory Board (TAB) comprised of professional geologists, mining engineers and technical specialists. Their combined experience and strengths help provide excellent guidance and qualified insight on the merits and potential of projects the Resinco Investment Committee is considering. The TAB members have years of experience working all over the world for numerous small companies as well as large international organizations consulting on grassroots, exploration and development stage projects. A selection of TAB members includes Dr. Rainer Lehne, John Kerr, Dr. Martin Keeley, and Murray McClaren. Dr. Rainer Lehne earned his doctorate in Natural Sciences from the University of Heidelberg. His many accomplishments include working on the feasibility study of BHP Billiton's world-class Antamina copper project in Peru and serving as the General Manager for Minera Inmet Peru S.A. "I'm a jack of all trades," says Dr. Lehne. "I have a relatively broad enough knowledge in raw materials from mineral resources to recyclable waste. I'm a general geologist and a specialist in applied mineralogy. Applied mineralogy is one of the key tools for project development." Professional geologist John Kerr, P.Eng. earned his BA Sc in Geological Engineering from UBC and his career as an exploration geologist in the mining industry includes such accomplishments as the discovery of the Santa Fe gold mine, the Calvada gold mine and the Mindora gold/silver deposit all in Nevada, as well as recognition of the Frasergold strata controlled gold deposit in British Columbia. "My career has spanned 46 years in the mineral exploration industry, with my principal interest having been early-stage mineral exploration," explains Mr. Kerr. "However, I have been involved with several large-scale, high expenditure resource development drilling projects." Dr. Martin Keeley earned his Ph.D in Geology from Trinity College Dublin, University of Dublin and has thirty years of experience in international oil and gas exploration and development. Mr. Keeley's accomplishments include discovering the Jurassic oil field in western Egypt, guiding Samsung towards the Issaouane farm-in discovery wells in Algeria, and developing major exploration plays in Colombia, Peru and Argentina. "I am a professional oil explorer," says Dr. Keeley. "I've worked for large companies such as Shell where there is not too much value to be added and I've gravitated toward small companies and towards working with investors and entrepreneurs where greater value can be added by using my abilities to identify early stage opportunities from their technical merits." Professional geologist Murray McClaren earned his B Sc in Geology from UBC and has over thirty-five years experience in exploration and discovery of mining properties. Mr. McClaren's accomplishments include the discovery of a lead-zinc district on northern Ellesmere Island, Canada; the rediscovery of the Boleo Copper Cobalt deposit in Baja, Mexico; the early identification and exploration of a 450 kilometer belt of IOCG deposits in northern Mexico; and the discovery and commercial development of several deposits in British Columbia. "I have varied expertise involving mineral programs from exploration to development and having actually hands on metallurgical experience," says Mr. McClaren. "I have an extensive background in a lot of varied deposit types . . . from Ellesmere Island to south of Mexico City." Balancing Risk/Reward Resinco's TAB members realize that balancing potential risk with possible rewards is fundamental to investment success. Each member has an extensive set of criteria they use for judging a project's value. "Balancing the risk-reward situation comes down to: is it appropriate for the company that is going to put up the risk capital?" says McClaren. "You have to look at all the variables and ask is this enough to make it attractive?" Both Mr. Kerr and Mr. McClaren follow a criteria checklist based on their trained expertise, which involves location, infrastructure, tenure, environmental sensitivities, available data, and mineability. When it comes to the available data, Kerr says if he's not at least eighty percent comfortable with the quality of the data he very likely will reject the property. And while data on paper is helpful, he prefers to conduct a site examination before making a final decision. "Having access to the rocks and site logistics permits me to obtain a good gut feel for whether there's exploration potential," he added. "We're trained to assess the viability of making a discovery of valuable mineral deposits on any property. We must be satisfied that there's room geologically for a sufficient size deposit and the grades are sufficiently well indicated that the project could be economically viable," explains Kerr. As an oil exploration professional, Dr. Keeley is a uniquely vital asset to Resinco. "It's important to appreciate that oil and gas are rather different resources than in mining and they require a rather different approach," clarifies Keeley. His approach involves "operating on a first principles basis and that is to say looking at a project from all its aspects be they legal, political risks, technical, or engineering before proceeding with the evaluation." Mitigating risk often involves reaching out to the public and dealing with the human side of the business, particularly a concerned local population. The TAB is well aware of the importance of addressing such concerns and members like Dr. Lehne have experience in dealing directly with the public. Speaking about one of Resinco's projects in his homeland of Germany, Lehne says "I prepared meetings in order to inform the communities, the county and the local people and I also invited environmental agencies and non-government organizations. They have been very positive toward our endeavour and I explained to them that of course mining can be done in an environmentally friendly way." Excited About Current Projects The TAB members are genuinely enthusiastic about the various projects in Resinco's portfolio. Two current projects that Dr. Lehne finds especially exciting are a mineral water project in southern Europe and a tin-tungsten-molybdenum (Sn-W-Mo) exploration project in Germany. The mineral water project recently received license approval from the Ministry of Economy and has already garnered the attention of food retailers from the Near East and Northern Africa looking to quench increasing demand for mineral water. "In my opinion a mineral water project in a stable country like the one in which the project is located represents a well defined endeavour that can be developed at a reasonable budget within less than two years," says Lehne. The Sn-W- Mo exploration project is located in eastern Germany in an area that has a long mining tradition. According to Dr. Lehne, there is a cluster of several Sn-W deposits on the 67 square km property that add up to an estimated 50 Mio t @ a grade of 0.2% Sn and 0.02-0.05% W. But what really excites Lehne about the property is the molybdenum mineralization: "In addition to [the tin and tungsten] there is this enigmatic and very interesting and very promising molybdenum mineralization. The molybdenum mineralization had been intersected in five holes. It is in the order of several million tonnes at an average grade of 0.1% Mo. This grade is a lot when it comes to molybdenum. Usually you don't have such high grades." Opportunities Going Forward Resinco's goal is to bring their shareholders value by targeting interesting and lucrative opportunities early and the members of the Technical Advisory Board are very adept at recognizing promising projects. "It's important by the nature of Resinco, wishing to see early stage resource assets, that it be counter-cyclical," advises Dr. Keeley. "So it must get into countries and plays where there is currently not a great deal of attention because the competition then would push up the price. One needs to go where other people currently are not." One sector that Dr. Lehne feels Resinco would benefit from targeting early is the renewable energies market, specifically waste to energy technologies. "In Europe, especially in Germany, there is a strong development of new technologies in the fields of energy generation from waste and unconventional raw materials. I think those technologies will dominate the market in the near future and I believe that this could be a field for Resinco as well." An investment in this area would dovetail into Resinco's investment mandate expansion, which has recently been broadened to embrace the renewable energy sector. | |||||
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