TRANSCRIPTION OF FINANCE NEWS NETWORK INTERVIEW WITH PILBARA MINERALS LIMITED
(ASX:PLS) DIRECTOR, MATHEW WALKER
Emma Pearson: Hello Emma Pearson reporting for the Finance News Network. Joining me today for the first time from Pilbara Minerals is Director, Mathew Walker. Mathew welcome to FNN, can you start by introducing Pilbara Minerals.
Mathew Walker: Pilbara Minerals is an Australian Public Company. We are currently looking to or seeking to list on the Australian Stock Exchange in April of 2010. We have a Prospectus that is currently available and we’re seeking to raise $6 million or up to $6 million at 20 cents per share.We have two key projects. Our lead project is located in the West Pilbara of Western Australia and our other project is a mineral sands or an iron sands project that’s located just south of Bengkulu in Sumatra, Indonesia. That money will be spent on exploration or advancing those two project areas, essentially evenly. We have an option over the tenements in Indonesia that takes us through till June and we will almost immediately launch into a drilling or trenching programme to try and define some high grade areas of what we have previously or essentially advancing the work that we’ve done previously. And we’ve also got some very exciting prospects in the West Pilbara - a very large significant land holding of 1,715 kilometres, it is almost continuous but very significant land holding in an area that is very strongly mineralised. We know it to be mineralised – there’re some deposits of a variety of different style of deposit, for example the platinum group metals, VMS deposits and also the nickel copper associated in and around Radio Hill. So we will look to commence those exploration activities immediately upon listing.
Emma Pearson: You’ve recently announced some Board changes, who is on the Board now and what is their experience?
Mathew Walker: The Board comprises of myself as Non-executive Chairman. I have a background in investment banking and financing and have been involved with public companies in corporate advisory work for many years now. We have James Robinson and we also have Gavan Farley who recently joined the Board and we welcome Gavan on board. He’s had extensive experience in international business and he’s also associated with the vendors of the West Pilbara Tenement.
Emma Pearson: Mathew turning to your tenements now. You have interests in four project areas in the West Pilbara of Western Australia and an exclusive option to acquire a single project in the Bengkulu Province of Sumatra Indonesia; can you introduce each of these assets to us?
Mathew Walker: The tenements themselves sit in a granite greenstone belt. It’s what they refer to as the Archaean Craton in the Pilbara or Archaean Pilbara Craton. The greenstone belt is known to exist – there is some overlay with what they refer to as the Fortescue Group sediments and within that there is some, it’s characterised by some intrusions of mafics and ultramafics, and the mineralisation is associated with these intrusions.So, the four project areas that we have are in and around the Radio Hill Deposit which is owned by Fox. There’s also the Platinum Group Deposits which we will be looking for, for example the Munni Munni Project from the ASX listed Platina. And further out towards the east of the tenement area, you’ve got those VMS style deposits associated with Whim Creek which was mined for a hundred years by Straits Resources and more recently as a leach operation for copper. So it’s a very, very prospective area. We have also - it’s never had a drill hole, it’s never really been subject to any advanced modern exploration techniques. There was a Aeromag Survey that was flown by the Bureau of Mineral and Resources back in the eighties. Obviously technology has improved significantly since the eighties so we would re-fly that with modern techniques follow up that with some ground geophysics and then we would be in a position where we believe, towards the end of the year to start drilling.
Emma Pearson: And what do you hope to find?
Mathew Walker: The area is known to host the platinum group metals so certainly that’s a primary target for us. Also the nickel copper deposit such as Radio Hill and it’s also, you know, known to host these VMS these massive sulphides associated towards the eastern side of the tenement boundaries. So that will be the focus, the base metals and the platinum group metals.
Emma Pearson: And the project in the Bengkulu Province of Sumatra?
Mathew Walker: Well the first thing you notice about the project in Sumatra is that the beach is black and it sticks to a magnet. So, we have an option over a hundred percent of a single KP that’s located there in Sumatra - six kilometres of beach front, its bulk tonnage, we know that the iron sands exist. What we are endeavouring to do, or what we will endeavour to do, is to try and narrow in on some higher grade zones and that will form the basis of our exploration activities immediately upon listing.It’s the type of project that you can get into production very readily. Our, if you like, the back of the envelope numbers would suggest that our one million tonne per annum operation up there could be put in place within a six or twelve month period. If you wanted to be a little bit more substantial and go for a five million tonne project, you’re looking at a capex of sort of circa USD$20 to 25 million, but it spits out some very good numbers at that stage. So it’s a very exciting project up there and one that is essentially immediately available for drilling or trenching.
Emma Pearson: And can you tell us what interest Pilbara Minerals has in each of these projects?
Mathew Walker: There’re thirteen granted tenements and we have seven now and the balance that the remaining six are subject to, one final condition precedent which is essentially listing on the ASX. So upon listing that transaction will settle and we’ll own in our own right an interest in thirteen. So they’ll be wholly owned in the thirteen granted Exploration Licences in the West Pilbara.
Emma Pearson: Last question. Mathew where do you see Pilbara Minerals six months from now?
Mathew Walker: Well, we’ll be drilling and we’ll be certainly, by this stage we will have made a decision in respect of to exercise and not to exercise the option over the project in Indonesia.
Emma Pearson: Mathew Walker, good luck with the capital raising.
Mathew Walker: Thank you Emma.
