Public Company News

Venus Metals and IGO have inked a binding agreement for exploration – and possibly development and extraction – at the pair’s Henderson nickel-lithium project in WA’s Eastern Goldfields. The deal involves a farm-in and joint venture in which a subsidiary of IGO can progressively acquire up to a 70 per cent interest in the project by spending $4 million on exploration and reimbursing Venus with $1 million.

WA explorer Terrain Minerals has extended an induced polarisation survey at its Smokebush project in the State’s Mid West region after its initial scrutiny picked up a third hidden target that has more than whetted its interest. Key permits have already been granted, with drill rig quotes also received, and Terrain hopes to get the drill bit spinning by the end of next month.

Horizon Minerals is targeting extensions to its known resource of 270,000 tonnes at 4.99g/t gold in a new drilling campaign at its high-grade Penny’s Find gold deposit, 50km north-east of Kalgoorlie. The company will drill 2400m of RC with diamond core tails. Penny’s Find gold production will follow Horizon’s Cannon gold mine, which will start production in the second half of this year.

Surefire Resources has commissioned METS Engineering to undertake vital metallurgical testwork at its Victory Bore project in Western Australia’s Mid West region to help further its bid to impact Australasia’s emerging vanadium battery sector. Management hopes the move will boost the project’s value by finding a streamlined separation process to extract vanadium from its magnetite hosts.

Galan Lithium has labelled its beefed-up resource “world class”, with 6.6 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent at 880 milligrams per litre lithium at its Hombre Muerto West project in Argentina. Management says it is the third significant resource upgrade in three years and 72 per cent of the new figure sits in the higher “measured” category, representing 4.7 million tonnes grading 873 mg/l lithium.

American West Metals has revealed immediate RC drill program success at its Storm copper project in Canada’s far north … with the promise of more to come. The North American-focused company says the first four holes completed at its 4100N prospect all intersected thick visual copper sulphide intervals, confirmed to contain copper based on portable XRF analysis.

Everest Metals believes the identification of a raft new pegmatites has significantly boosted the potential of its Mt Edon mining lease near Paynes Find. Deep Ground Penetration Radar survey over 21 line kilometres shows 133 pegmatite-like anomalies prospective for lithium-tantalum and rare earths mineralisation that extends to depths greater than 50m. The discovery has sparked a new drilling program, to start within a fortnight.

Australian oil and gas company Empire Energy Group has turned the tap back on at its Carpentaria-2H gas well in the Northern Territory’s world-renowned Beetaloo sub-basin as it sets its sites on a pilot production plant. The well clocked a March quarter production rate of 2.81 million standard cubic feet per day over a 30-day period, up 17 per cent from previous tests.

ASX-listed Chimeric Therapeutics has been granted an Indian patent for its CLTX CAR therapies as it closes in on getting similar protection in Israel for its cell treatment for patients with glioblastoma. The new patent in India covers particular applications of the company’s technology which uses chlorotoxin, an amino acid peptide derived from deathstalker scorpion venom that it has utilised for its cancer fighting treatments.

Image Resources has lifted the heavy mineral content production from its Boonanarring mineral sands project north of Perth by 18 per cent during the March quarter, compared to the previous three-month period. According to the company’s latest quarterly report, the production increase is due to higher ore grades, despite a decrease in the amount of ore tonnes processed.

Northern Minerals’ definitive feasibility study for its Browns Range rare earths project in WA is on track to be completed in the fourth quarter of this year, as it continues to develop mining, metallurgical processing and plant and engineering design studies. The mining strategy has been determined as an open pit to 125m depth, followed by an underground mine at its Wolverine deposit.

Smart home technology company Zimi has produced an impressive March quarter to generate more value in receipts from customers in the the last three months than in the combined amount from its previous two reporting periods. The company collected $464,000 in customer receipts in the quarter, compared to a combined $308,000 from the entire first half of the financial year, according to its latest quarterly report.