Someone asked the question before with Aurum's and Mako's leases...

Someone asked the question before with Aurum's and Mako's leases around 110 km apart what synergies could be achieved? Would the ore grade support transport to a plant located roughly in the middle of the two?

I think the answer lies in careful studies of the drilling data facilitated by the immense computing power available these days.

Mako have declared their resource at 1.3 g/t. I would anticipate Aurums being economic at 1.1 to 1.2g/t. What actually happens when you move to reserve to constituting ore is the extra drilling density means the grade goes up slightly and the tonnes down by excluding more waste. If AUE was to go it alone post-merger (i.e. not bought up by Purseus or others). Each of the current AUE a MKR would put some effort into determining what material could be heap leached at say 0.5g/t. near their mines. Thus lowering the strip ratio in the pits upping the grade of the material to be transported to a central plant and likely marginally reducing the cut-off grade of treated materials by say 0.005g/t on each resource.

I anticipate the extra trucking cost of getting the ore to a more central plant at about 0.3 g/t. I've roughly done that calculation on MM8's recent plan to transport their ore 180km to Cosmic Boy's currently built plant in Forrestania after adjusting it to CIP treatment - it might be fractionally cheaper in Cote'd'ivore due to the labour component. The rough doubling of the size of AUE mill will provide offsetting cost efficiencies. We know Tietto (TIE - Caigen's previous mine) moved to include a heap leach more recently. Caigen has also said they would look into heap leach potential for AUE ore.

I recognize and apologize for repeating part of the post that was a previous response post merger announcement. I hope that poster will accept that I have come at it with fresh eyes and I value the thought behind their rapid response earlier. Perhaps taking this as further validation of that response.

All IMVHO