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 welcome to CEO insights I'm Marilyn de Gusman with investing news.com I'm speaking with Andrew warland managing director and CEO of international raight good good to see you so let's start our conversation with just the recent news that you've uh released which is the uh commissioning of your new micronizing plan could you talk a bit more about this and why is an important mind sure look um we see ourselves very seriously as a as a graphite production company um developing into quite a significant you

know Western production house uh one of the ways that we anticipate getting into the marketplace um is to pursue this mized graphite business our marketing analysis over the last four to 5 years has suggested there's a real opportunity in micronized graphite um and and the real benefit for it relies in the fact that it's the first stage in the battery anod processing uh flow sheet and so we can we're looking to establish a business in coli in 200 km south of Perth in in Western Australia that will

uh treat graphite concentrates um it initially imported graphite concentrates and then ultimately some concentrates from our springd mine um which I'm sure we'll talk about and uh and and establish a business prior to getting that integrated battery anode facility um and and Springdale battery anode facility project into operation um in 3 or four years time so what are the features of this plant like what are some of the advented well the the main characteristic of it is it's it's it's

used for validating product with customers and so it's it's well beyond a a pilot scale piece of Machinery um it's some 6 to 7 m in in height maybe 7even or eight meters in in breadth so it's a a very serious piece of Kit um in many non-g graphite applications it's a the Mills and so forth are are commercial size um facilities so so the the plant itself is um like I said a very serious piece of Kit and it's and it's going to be used to treat concentrates and produce a mized product of various

qualities um and then send that to customers who will validate it and then that'll essentially be the go-ahead for us to take that product endorsement and and proceed with a commercial scale facility which would be eight or nine times the scale of that of that um qualification so PL that we have in at col we looking to get the feed that uh to feed the the plan yeah so initially to be imported uh concentrate so we looking at um third party producers of graphite concentrate around the world right so now let's talk about your

Springdale project uh could you uh list some of the key advantages of what makes it a compelling asset Springdale is located on the south coast of Western Australia it's about 600 km from Perth fully sealed roads all the way to site um and it's got well surrounded by great infrastructure airport um Ravens Thorp nickel mine which is owned by first Quantum uh is is 20 km to the north of us uh one of the world's Premier lithium mines in Mount Catlin is is also close by so we're right in the middle of a

both a mining and also a farming Community um and so we've got access to services and infrastructure and so forth that many remote uh remote mines don't have so we're starting from a quite a degree of um um uh strength if you like in developing the project the the main characteristics of the project are that it's a got a significant resource we've uh established um through about 30,000 M of drilling now a resource of 49 million tons at just over 6 and a half% uh total graffiti content content for 3.4 million

tons of contained metal that puts it in you know a serious world class scale um as a deposit so it has that which is going to mean long life so we'll be mining there for 50 60 years um and that's still with a lot of exploration potential for the asset the other attributes of it that um I think make it unique and compelling for investors are its its cost structure and a lot of that is to do with Mother Nature frankly um the mineralization itself is a fines graphite so we we've got a very simple

flotation process we don't have the issues that other graphite deposits have where you've got to separate out your course and and your your flake sorry your your jumbo and Co flakes for example which go to different different markets we have one product that means a simple flow sheet a lower Capital cost for the for the um for the project uh the the average drill hole is 69 m in the across the deposit so all of our mining in the first 20 or so years will be in weathered and oxide material so um

free digging cheap mining costs um our scoping study released back in January of this year showed that we could hold the mine grade at about 10% for the first 15 years which is all we could publish for ASX purposes so we've got a high grade um mining operation so those those factors alone lead lend himself to a really competitive operating cost for the for the project um the location is amazing we've got um accommodation that's already built um around in the region we have water on site we have

roads two site um sealed and then unsealed roads so all of those infrastructure challenges that many deposits have because they're essentially stranded we don't have and so that's that that's lent itself to a real saving for us in Capital cost estimate relative to some of our peers um and again that's the the blessing of Mother Nature and so we we're really fortunate in their regards so so we think we've got a really really strong project development scenario down at

Springdale um the capital cost is somewhere around 76 million dollars for 40,000 tons of concentrate per anom um and and some and some years well above 40,000 tons given the grade profile so yeah we think we've got some great attributes of that project that that make it a stand out now I understand F New York one of their strategies is to uh the all and integrated uh supply chain working white bring that land of P they spring project together why is that an important undertaking cre in how would this

getable gra they deal with graice yeah so I mean everybody should be aiming to get as close to their Market as they possibly can that's where the highest value product is so from a just a purely economic and financial perspective all companies would like to get as close as they can to the market with the finished product and we're we're we're very much in that um frame precisely uh what Market comes to what product comes to Market at what time is still to be determined by a feasibility

study uh there are there are stepping off points along the way to battery Ando material with our established markets um and then and the project itself lends itself to scaling and um incremental growth uh as the market grows as well so we've got some another that's another great attribute of of the mine and concentrator itself so um at the moment we're targeting 40,000 tons of concentrate there's the market for graphite somewhere in the order of 1.5 million tons of um synthetic and natural

graphite concentrate production uh our battery ano plant would produce somewhere in the order of 20,000 tons so we're not going to be disruptive and we' we've deliberately um we've diff deliberately aimed at that strategy uh to to ensure that you know we're not producing too much product that the market can't handle H and as the market grows for for um Bano material we'll be able to expand our for ities as the market grows and so we think we've got a great entry point of that 20,000 tons um

of battery outo material so what's the man tring for for both the the col and so just on the coli PL uh customer validation on product sampling uh and then making a final investment decision uh probably Q3 of this year that's a a 6 to 12 month build and we should be fully operational in coli uh producing about 4,000 tons of mized graphite uh the back end of next calendar year um as Springdale and the Bano material the integrated MTO Market strategy all about feasibility work so we've got some

drilling more drilling to do down in Springdale to improve the indicated um level of mineral resource do M more exploration at our discovery of Mason Bay last year um and then we're into the perming process for for the asset itself which we don't think will be particularly controversial the we're on cleared farming land so uh there ought not to be be too many um challenges arising out of the permitting it's really about res resources within the government departments and getting them

to the information and then giving them time to assess it um given the amount of priority projects they have on their books so um we foresee having the technical studies completed this year for the m and concentrator we hope to have the perm in hand later this year for it if not first quarter next year um and that'll allow us to proceed with the development of of Springdale um in on the Bano side all about work in in uh particularly in mizing sping and purification um and we've got we've got

about 120 kilos of concentrate from Springdale that we prepared last year from Dore and that will be part of our testwork program uh both at both in coli at our facility in K but also in in Germany where we do some purification work so we got a busy year ahead uh to pull it all together um but we got a very invigorated and um enthusiastic group of people working for us so we're we're thrilled with the progress we've made and we're we can't wait to get into the balance of the year so we're at bbac

and do talking to investors in hential investors um if you were to summarize the J CFT fight one makes it a compelling investment opportunity of for for me it's value right now uh we're we're on a trajectory that would see us by the end of this year equal to where our peers have been and a couple of our peers that are trying to implement this m to Market strategy that we have as well there's four or five companies around the world that that are doing this they're more advanced than us

because they've been at it a little longer um but we're rapidly catching up we think in terms of the Min and concentrator so um if if investors can take a look at the quality of our assets and have a look at the um the forecast and assess the pering regime and so forth I think investors will conclude quickly that there's a real value opportunity for us relative to the to the peers um and so that's for me the the most compelling aspect of interal graph of this point in our Circle right

well great thanks great to talk to you today Andrew thanks for taking the ti thanks ra good to you and thanks everyone for watching join us again next time for another engaging conversation on CEO and sites if you like this video make sure you subscribe to our Channel and turn on notifications so you don't miss future updates and interviews see you next [Music] time