Koryx Copper Inc. has strengthened its leadership by appointing a new CFO, Tony da Silva, and a technical management team with a proven track record from Osino’s Twin Hills Gold Project, to expedite the development of the Haib Copper Project in Namibia. This move aims to reposition Koryx as a leading African copper developer and to push the project towards construction readiness swiftly.
Heye Daun, Koryx Executive Chairman stated: “After investing our own capital into Koryx earlier in 2024 and being appointed to the Board of Directors as Executive Chair and Lead director earlier this month we are fortunate to attract the skilled technical and executive management required to re-position Koryx as a successful Namibian copper developer with significant scale potential. The team’s track record and experience, particularly in Namibia, in advancing Osino’s Twin Hills Gold Project from discovery to construction is a great example of our vision for Koryx Copper. That vision is to demonstrate the technical and economic feasibility of the Haib Copper Project as the next great copper development asset in Africa. We plan to achieve this by financing the company, building a competent management team and then permitting and advancing the project to construction readiness in as short a timeframe as possible.”
Appointment of Technical and Management Team
A strong technical team has been identified who have already started driving a number of exploration & project development initiatives with the aim of optimizing and right-sizing the Haib Copper Project. A particular focus is on testing the significant growth potential of the mineral resource at Haib, whilst demonstrating the feasibility of a more conventional metallurgical process route (crushing, milling & flotation for higher-grade material as well as coarse particle flotation and bacterial heap leaching for lower grade material). Environmental baseline studies and other de-risking activities are underway.
Tony da Silva – Chief Financial Officer
Tony has approximately 20 years of experience as a finance professional in private and public companies, auditing and capital asset management. Tony is the former CFO of Osino Resources Corp. and has been instrumental in the successful advancement, financing and sale of Osino Resources Corp. As Osino’s CFO he was instrumental in concluding all of Osino’s financings and was responsible for all financial controls, stock exchange reporting and ensuring compliance in multiple jurisdictions. He was also instrumental in the formation of Lotus Gold Corp. (an Egypt exploration company), and other projects and companies. He has previously worked at Nexia International and BlueAlpha Investment Management. Tony is a qualified accountant with degrees from Universities of South Africa and Natal and he is a Registered Chartered Accountant (CA(SA)) in South Africa since 2004.
Charles Creasy – Head of Project Development
Charles is a geologist with over 24 years of professional experience and more than 16 years’ experience in the mining industry. He holds a BSc (Hons) Geology degree from London University and B.Econ from Stellenbosch. Charles began his career with Randgold Resources, in greenfield regional exploration, before pivoting to focus on the development of major gold mine development projects in West and Central Africa at Randgold Resources. He was responsible for project technical studies and financial evaluations of assets to pass strategic filters for capital investment. Most recently Charles was the Feasibility Manager for Osino Resources and lead the completion of various technical studies for Osino’s Twin Hills Gold Project. Charles had an especially noteworthy and successful role in leading the entire permitting process for the Twin Hills Gold Project in Namibia, achieving the full permitting of the project within 3 years which ultimately lead to the successful sale of the project to Shanjin International Gold.
Steve Burks – Senior Metallurgical Study Consultant
Steve has about 40 years of wide-ranging processing plant and mine experience gained in production and project implementation roles. He is a minerals processing engineer who transitioned from process plant design roles into study and business unit management at Bateman Engineering and Lycopodium Minerals Africa. At Bateman, he was Chief Technology Officer for several years, including direct responsibility for investigation of copper sulphide leach technologies incorporating development of partnerships and relationships with several commercial technology suppliers. In addition, he worked at Advisian as a management consultant providing operational improvement advice as well as providing mining and processing value chain optimisation services during a 4-year period as Managing Director of Whittle Consulting Africa. Between 2020 and 2024, Steve worked part-time for Osino Resources on the Twin Hills Gold Project in Namibia, most recently as the Project Director responsible for the overall definitive feasibility study and (DFS) and coordination of several front-end engineering design (FEED) contracts. Steve applied his experience to provide a highly professional project management approach which was tested and confirmed by multiple intensive lender due diligence processes as part of the Twin Hills Gold Project financing.
Jon Andrew – Vice President Exploration
Jon is a professional geologist with more than 30 years’ experience in Exploration and Mining Geology. His career has been focused on the Africa and Middle East regions and includes diverse experience in precious, base and rare metals and industrial minerals. He has held exploration manager and senior consulting positions with several major and junior mining companies listed on all major international stock exchanges. Early career roles with Gold Fields and BHP Billiton developed into management roles with juniors including Albidon Limited, North River Resources and Osino Resources Corp. Jon was responsible for the start-up and management of the Osino exploration projects in Namibia since inception in 2016 until the discovery and subsequent drill-out of Osino’s Twin Hills gold deposit in Namibia in 2020 and as such played an integral part in the discovery and development of Twin Hills. Jon is currently also VP Exploration for Lotus Gold Corp.
Board Changes
Furthermore, Matthew Starnes has resigned from the Board of Directors, effective 1 October 2024. Matthew has been a Director of Koryx since February 27, 2024 and the Board of Directors and management of Koryx thank Matthew for his dedicated and committed service over the last 7 months.