An Oman oil, gas, mining and processing company is to invest more than $50m to buy a stake in Canada’s Nautilus Minerals.
The Canadian firm is to raise a total of nearly $100m through a private placement of common shares to fund the development of its first project – Solwara 1 in the Bismarck Sea of Papua New Guinea.
Investors participating in the placing include Mawarid Mining, a subsidiary of MB Holdings Company based in Muscat, Oman, Nautilus said in a statement.
Mawarid will purchase 19.4 million shares, equivalent to 9.98 percent of the expanded share capital of the company, it added.
Nautilus president and CEO Steve Rogers said the private placement would provide funds for the construction of the seafloor resource production system, which initially will be deployed at Solwara 1 – the company’s first deepwater copper and gold project.
Under the terms of the agreement, the private placement will be completed in two tranches, with the final closing taking place on October 6.
Rogers said he was pleased to welcome Mawarid Mining, with its strong mining and oil and gas pedigree, as a shareholder of Nautilus and noted the continued support from Metalloinvest and Anglo American.
The MB group employs more than 6,500 employees from 51 nationalities in the oil & gas, manufacturing and mining industries.
First established in 1982, the group has operations and subsidiaries spread across the globe, including the Middle East, Europe, North Africa, Asia, Asia-Pacific, Australia and New Zealand.
It was the first private sector organisation to engage in gold and copper exploration in Oman, where it operates several open pit copper mines and processes ore at its copper concentrate facility in the Al Batinah region.
“This is a growing organisation with expertise in areas that are very relevant to our business. Its decision to participate as a shareholder represents another major vote of confidence in Nautilus and in the emerging seafloor resources industry,” said Rogers.
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