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February 9 - 15, 2010 edition Tue 09/02/2010

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AUSTMINE

Exclusive survey: Australia's leading mining service and technology companies

THE domestically owned and based portion of Australia’s mining technology and services sector is a $A27.4 billion industry segment in its own right, directly employing more than 82,000 people. It grew by nearly 19% overall in fiscal 2009 despite the harsh downturn in mine and exploration spending. A HighGrade survey of 80 leaders highlights the resilience of the sector and, in all probability, the next group of IPOs and/or M&A targets.

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Quote of the Week“If you had a confidence-o-metre, then two weeks ago it would have been as high as it has been in a very long time … [But] the stock market just erased all those confidence gains in about three days. It took a long time to bring it back and it can go out the window much faster than it goes in.” - DJ Carmichael's James Wilson

Exploration technique takes root

MINOTAUR Exploration is looking forward to drill testing targets in the Gawler Craton generated by deep-rooted plant geochemistry, a technique that it’s hoping could prove a big breakthrough for exploration of the sand-covered province. It’s also one of a number of exploration programs being finalised by one of Australia’s better credentialed explorers.

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Citi goes around the gold block; likes offshore view

MORE proof of the dearth of promising gold stories located in Australia can be found in recent analysis of the Australian junior gold sector that listed Medusa Mining and OceanaGold as the two preferred stocks in terms of market potential. However, others might query whether the analysis was a tad limited in scope.

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Big names have already heard Citronen's call

WHEN Ironbark’s youthful managing director Jonathon Downes says he has “absolutely no doubt” that the Citronen zinc project will be developed and that it will be producing for the “rest of his natural life”, one gets a fair idea of both how good and how big this project in Greenland is.

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Advertisement

Olympus joins running mate

JOHN Seton is intent on making up for lost time, and with the newly merged Olympus Pacific Minerals he chairs already in production and with a road mapped out to reach 300,000 ounces per annum in Southeast Asia by 2014, he should be able to make good time. Especially given the extremely lacklustre multiples currently being accorded the Canadian and Australian-listed company.

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DMS paves way for Yukon DFS

HUGH Bresser, the managing director of zinc hopeful Overland Resources, is expecting significant market interest in the company he heads once the news flow increases following a $A6 million capital raising.

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Rare aired at Indaba

GOLD and rare earths were among the commodities getting the ticks at Indaba while those in the uranium sector may have to bunker down for a couple of years and those with iron ore dreams should enjoy the good times while they last.

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Advertisement

Great Scott, the English are coming

WE’RE growing fast and we’re heading to Australasia. That’s the message from managing director of Scott Wilson’s dynamic mining arm, Graham Clow, who is setting out to bolster the division’s presence in Asia and Australia backed by the handsome purse of the wider Scott Wilson group.

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Top 10 fastest growing Australians

COMPANY results for the first half of the current fiscal year might give a clearer picture of the aftermath of the 2008 global financial meltdown, and in particular the mining investment slump in the first half of 2009. But they won’t erase some glowing growth stories from FY09 – headed by a New South Wales longwall equipment supplier.

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Australian MTS leaders snapshot

A QUICK look at the 80 leaders in HighGrade’s 2010 Australian mining technology and service sector survey.

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Gemcom, Avalon, Rio Tinto and BHPB appointments

SOFTWARE house Gemcom Software International has welcomed Canadian Eric Palmer back home as its new CFO, and elevated Ben Farquharson to the position of Minex business unit director.

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New signal from South America

PERU’S leading publicly listed precious metals miner Compañía de Minas Buenaventura has opted for Australian underground mine Wi-Fi communications technology for its main gold operation in southern Peru. The deal is significant for the supplier, Mine Site Technologies, because it potentially opens up the South American mining market to the newer technology.

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VIEW FROM THE WEST END

Picks and shovels

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THAT old adage that in a gold rush it is best to be the one selling the picks and shovels has never been truer.

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GOLD

Boddington versus the rest

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IT’S not every year that a million ounce gold mine opens in Australia. In fact, the list of million ounce-ish producers around the world is rather short and Boddington will be Australia’s biggest mine. So how does Newmont’s brand new Boddington mine stack up against some of the other 1Moz plus mega mines in the world?

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GOLD

Lower gold price won't see Boddington unplugged: O'Brien

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A BROWNFIELDS site in the middle of a state forest, boasting incredibly hard rocks and a low grade resource, may not be the most prepossessing starter kit for Australia’s largest gold mine.

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GOLD

School of hard rocks

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ROCK hardness and low grades are two of the big challenges facing Newmont Mining’s Boddington restart, its ongoing mine life and cost control. Newmont has chosen to tackle the first through implementing technological solutions, primarily high pressure grinding rolls, and the second through sheer scale.

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FINANCE

Vulcan's Cowden looks for re-rating

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IT IS a truth universally acknowledged that junior explorers with big but challenging projects find it extremely difficult to make the leap into production. Vulcan Resources’ Alistair Cowden is hoping the merger with Universal Resources will help the new company scale the production barrier.

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CONSULTING

Consultants plot a new course

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THE big names in the billion-dollar-a-year business of giving mining companies high-level technical advice are the same. But specialist mining consultants haven’t been through 10 years of change like the decade just ended, a period which seriously bruised some firms and delivered unprecedented opportunities for others.

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CONSULTING

There's movement at (beneath) the stations

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THE scramble to secure people – the “right people” – to position mining consulting firms to not only handle higher volumes of work, but to complete it to the high standards they’ve traditionally set for themselves, is on again.

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INSIGHT

Talking heads: the issues that matter to miners in 2010

AFTER the extended summer break the mining industry feels like it is just getting back into the swing of things. But 2010 is already shaping as another interesting year with key concerns like the Henry tax review and the carbon pollution reduction scheme already grabbing the headlines against a backdrop of renewed market volatility.

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A word or three about nickel; mine opening is 'Gold'; Kagara's open book; Avoca closes in

TIME for contrarians to start thinking nickel? We’d probably be the least capable clowns on planet earth to make this call, but certainly Australia stocks in the sector have been given a right royal thrashing over the past six months.

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