Keep up with the latest executive movements across the mining sector, including Fortescue, Aurelia Metals and Richmond Vanadium.
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Fortescue Metals Group has appointed a new chief financial officer (CFO) almost six months after former CFO Ian Wells resigned.
Christine Morris has been appointed in Wells’ place, bringing over 30 years experience to the table, spanning across energy, media and telecom, manufacturing and technology.
“Christine is a very experienced CFO with a successful track record in aligning financial and corporate strategy and leading the finance divisions of global organisations,” Fortescue chief executive officer Fiona Hick said.
“I look forward to Christine joining Fortescue as CFO of Fortescue Metals and working together to maintain Fortescue’s position as the world’s best, lowest cost iron ore operator.”
Morris said she was delighted to be joining Fortescue and was dedicated to delivering the company mission of eliminating emissions profitably and leading heavy industry to decarbonise globally.
“My focus will be on continuing to provide exceptional value for Fortescue shareholders and maintaining and growing the strength of our iron ore and emerging critical minerals business,” Morris said.
“I am pleased to be joining Fortescue, a hugely successful company that is undergoing significant transformation to become a global green energy and resources company.”
Aurelia Metals has appointed former OZ Minerals executive Bryan Quinn as its new managing director and chief executive officer (CEO).
Quinn had led the growth, strategy, exploration, sales and marketing businesses at OZ over the past 12 months and spent more than 27 years before that at BHP, where he was employed in various president and general management roles.
Quinn’s appointment coincides with the departure of Andrew Graham who had served in an interim CEO role since November 2022.
“Mr Quinn’s extensive experience in business improvement, operational excellence and project delivery is an ideal background to help Aurelia deliver on its exciting development pathway for Federation and Great Cobar, whilst optimising value and performance of our existing assets,” Aurelia chair Peter Botten said.
“With the refreshed management team and a competitive and flexible financing package now in place, Aurelia is well positioned to deliver on its value-adding growth trajectory. This represents a pivot point for the company, and we look forward to providing our shareholders with reliable value enhancement.”
Aurelia also announced it has secured approximately $100 million in financing through a loan and environmental bond.
This will support the development of the Federation restart project, which Aurelia believes to be one of the highest-grade base metals projects in Australia.
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Shaun Ren has retired as managing director of Richmond Vanadium Technology (RVT) and will be succeeded by Jon Price.
Price was most recently managing director of Horizon Minerals and is currently a non-executive director of Richmond Vanadium. He has also held senior management and executive positions at the likes of Gold Fields and Phoenix Gold.
“We thank Shaun for his expertise, dedication and invaluable contribution to the growth of our business, including recently as the managing director of the company’s initial public offering (IPO) in late 2022,” Richmond Vanadium non-executive chair Brendon Grylls said.
“As a metallurgist with a Masters in Mineral Economics, he (Price) brings with him a deep understanding of the project and a passionate advocacy to build a new industry for Australia.
“With the world facing unprecedented change and looking towards renewable energy to combat the effects of climate change, we believe that Jon is the ideal candidate to build on Shaun’s work and lead RVT through the next phase of its journey.”
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Tietto Minerals has appointed Matt Wilcox as its new managing director and CEO, having been promoted from executive director and chief operating officer.
Wilcox has been rewarded for overseeing the on-time and below budget construction and commissioning of the Abujar gold mine in Côte d’Ivoire, where Tietto expects to produce between 105,000 to 120,000 ounces gold for the six months from July this year.
Wilcox’s appointment follows Tietto founder Caigen Wang’s retirement after more than 13 years at the company.
“We gratefully acknowledge the extraordinary achievements of Caigen, who founded Tietto in 2010,” Tietto chair Francis Harper said.
“Caigen persisted through difficult market cycles until he was able to acquire the Abujar licences in 2014 for Tietto and was able to privately finance the company with a loyal group of private investors until the IPO of Tietto in January 2018.”
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Greg Barfoot has joined Patriot Battery Metals in the role of vice president project development.
Barfoot has experience in all phases of mining project development from concept to operations, having managed projects of up to $6.5 billion in invested capital across various commodities.
Barfoot most recently spent eight years managing infrastructure development for BHP’s Jansen potash mine in Canada.
“Our team is growing as we start heading down the development pathway for the CV5 project,” Patriot president, CEO and director Blair Way said. “It is very exciting to be building a team that is so well qualified and passionate about the sustainable advancement of the Corvette lithium district.”
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