Yahoo Finance Gates and Bezos fund invests in Aim-listed rare earth miner
A battery minerals venture backed by Bill Gates, Michael Bloomberg and Jeff Bezos has struck a deal with minnow Bluejay Mining to develop a major nickel, copper and cobalt project in Greenland.
KoBold Metals will earn 51pc of Bluejay’s Disko-Nuussuaq licence under a two-stage earn-in deal in which it will spend about $15m (£11m) on geological evaluation and drilling using its own technology.
The licence covers an area of almost 3,000 sq km that Bluejay believes has the potential to “host multiple globally significant occurrences of nickel and copper”.
Demand for both is expected to grow due to their use in electric car batteries and electric wiring amid efforts to shift away from fossil fuels.
Bluejay is also behind the Dundas Ilmenite project in north-west Greenland, which won a 30-year licence from the Government in December. It is expected to produce up to 600,000 tonnes a year of the mineral used in paints, plastics and cosmetics.
KoBold Metals uses sophisticated computing to try to better predict the availability of minerals and metals underground, aiming to boost supplies of materials needed for electric cars and electronics.
Its main investors include Breakthrough Energy Ventures, the clean tech venture capital fund led by Bill Gates, whose backers include Bloomberg, Bezos, and Softbank chairman Masayoshi Son.
KoBold is also backed by Equinor, Norway’s state energy company, and Andreessen Horowitz, the Silicon Valley venture capital firm.
Kurt House, chief executive of KoBold, said: “The Disko region has seen the rare convergence of events in earth’s history that could have resulted in forming a world-class battery metal deposit.
“KoBold’s technology is perfectly suited to discovering new resources at Disko. Our proprietary library of analytical tools, Machine Prospector, will enable effective deployment of exploration capital and maximise our chances of discovery at Disko-Nuussuaq.”
Bo Stensgaard, chief executive of Bluejay, said: “This agreement is transformative for Bluejay. We are delighted to have a partner at the pinnacle of technical innovation for new exploration methods, backed by some of the most successful investors in the world.
“Additionally, Bluejay retains the ability to self-fund to maintain a 49pc ownership through to production, providing external public investors with the opportunity of investing alongside a private investment entity of this magnitude.”
ESM seeks $400m in float to mine copper and gold in Romania
The news comes as a miner seeking to tap Romania’s vast gold deposits plans a dual-listing on London’s main market.
Canada-listed Euro Sun Mining will today announce its intention to float as it progresses its wholly owned Rovina Valley project.
It said it was one of the largest undeveloped projects in Europe, covering a 27 sq km area in a historic mining district of central Romania.
ESM wants to get the $400m (£288m) project up and running by 2024, with potential production of 106,000 ounces of gold and 19m lb of copper each year for the first decades. Concentrate will be sold to European smelters.
The listing will raise the company’s profile with UK and European investors, the company said. It is not planning to raise additional capital alongside the listing. Led by chief executive Scott Moore, ESM is valued at about C$68m (£40m) on the Toronto stock exchange.
The company has been awarded exploitation permits and said it did not plan to use cyanide during processing, lowering its environmental impact.
Mr Moore said: “There is a short supply of copper and gold produced within Europe and ESM is well placed to help fill it.
“Once in production, we expect to be one of the most efficient and environmentally responsible producers of gold and copper not only in Europe but globally.”
