There are two parts to the story from my perspective; one is what sort of geo is he and what is his track record, experience etc. The second, is what has happened for AVB since he came on board.
An RMIT graduate in Geology who started out working for RGC and Northern Gold in the Pine Creek Goldfields region of the Northern Territory. His first gig as exploration geologist was with Solomon Pacific. Where he discovered the Zapopan Underground deposit, his first ever exploration success. This was the extension of the original turn off the century Zapopan underground mine. Numerous other companies and their geo teams had tried but failed to find the extension at depth of Zapopan. Simon Mottram got it on the second hole of the drill program designed to test his interpretation of the geology. There is now a deposit named after him I believe "Mottrams".
Simon Mottram worked in Western Australia as Chief Geologist (Exploration and Mining) for Metex Resources Ltd and Exploration Superintendent forPacMin Mining Corporation. He left Metex to rejoin the geo team of Peter Langworthy at Jubilee Mines. He had previously been with Peter Langworthy of WMC fame at PacMin. Most of this activity was focussed on Nickel.
At Jubilee mines SM was responsible for the Sinclair Nickel deposit discovery in the Bannockburn project. The Jubilee general manager of exploration Peter Langworthy had called Simon Mottram in after working with him on earlier projects at other companies. Naturally senior management got the kudos but we know who the man running the program on the ground was. It is interesting to note that Xtrata, who did a takeover of Jubilee some years back for megabucks (which my father in-law still calls one of his best investments ever, he was loaded up on JBM early in the piece) have put the Cosmos deposit on care and maintenance yet are still producing from their Sinclair deposit discovered by SM.
After Jubilee Mines Simon Mottram moved on to Falcon Minerals and their main project, its promising Collurabbie nickel-PGE joint venture with BHP Billiton north of Mt Keith in Western Australia as exploration manager. At Falcon Minerals he worked exclusively on Ni/Cu/PGE mineralized intrusions. (I believe there was quite a bit of corporate action being tried at the time as well, it was still Nickel boom days). However, soon after Xtrata did the takeover of Jubilee etc and Simon Mottram was offered the position as Country Manager for Asia Mineral resources, a TSX listed company (http://www.asianminres.com/ ) in Vietnam. So a very senior set of responsibilities and VERY capable exploration manager. He went on to take that project from exploration through to production. He has now had involvement at a senior level in managing 2 projects from exploration through to mine construction and full production.
So the second part of the story; since arriving at AVB what has he achieved?
In a sentence, over 900K tonnes of copper sulphide resources in only two years! He commenced with AVB January 2011. It is interesting to read the 2010 AGM presentation and then compare with the company's prospects today. It is obvious that AVB's ability to find more copper, at very good grades with less spend has increased with the addition of Simon Mottram to the team. I am looking forward to what he can achieve when AVB have stage 1 running, cash flow and serious exploration recommences. In the meantime, as a member of the management team approaching construction etc, he has the runs on the board as well.
NB (Peter Langworthy was exploration manager at Jubilee Mines. Langworthy had previously been WMC Resources' principal exploration manager for the Leinster and Mt Keith-Leinster nickel belts, the same region where Jubilee operates. He was at WMC for 11 years, after which he was part of the management team with PacMin Mining).
AVB Price at posting:
9.4¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
