Wyloo Metals and Mincor Resources are joining forces to capitalise on the potential of the Kambalda nickel sulphide operation in WA.
Having achieved more than 90 per cent interest ownership of Mincor shares, Wyloo will proceed with a compulsory acquisition of the company. This has resulted in some director resignations, but otherwise no other Mincor personnel changes have been announced at this stage.
Mincor managing director and chief executive officer (CEO) Gabrielle Iwanow said her company brings plenty of expertise to Wyloo.
“Mincor has a great team of some of the world’s very best, highly respected technical experts who have a detailed understanding of WA’s nickel resources,” she said. “Wyloo made it clear from the outset that they were not only attracted to Mincor’s projects, but also its people.
“There’s a clear cultural fit and a drive for growth that’s common across both companies. The team is really excited to see what we can achieve when we bring together Mincor’s producing assets with Wyloo’s plans for downstream processing and long-term growth projects.”
The Mincor acquisition sees Wyloo become a nickel sulphide producer, something which Andrew Forrest, chair of Wyloo parent company Tattarang, said was a clear objective.
“Wyloo has targeted nickel sulphides as they are the greenest and cheapest option for battery manufacturing: they have the best economics, can be processed into battery grade nickel with the lowest environmental footprint and are fully recyclable,” he said.
“We are going to give the market a choice between clean nickel and dirty nickel.”
These sentiments were echoed by Wyloo CEO Luca Giacovazzi.
“The acquisition of Mincor turns Wyloo into a fully integrated nickel business that brings together high-grade nickel production from Kambalda with our planned downstream processing facility in Kwinana,” he said.
“The acquisition also complements our high-grade Eagle’s Nest nickel-copper-PGE project in Ontario and our exploration projects in Quebec.
“By adding Mincor to our portfolio, we’ve introduced a producing mine alongside our long-life development projects, with all our orebodies located in the tier one jurisdictions of Australia and Canada.”
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