Cobre has signed a letter of intent (LoI) with a wholly owned subsidiary of BHP Group for a material earn-in joint venture (JV) agreement over the former’s Kitlanya West and East copper projects in Botswana.
These projects are located on the northern and southern basin margins of the Kalahari Copper Belt.
The proposed transaction builds on Cobre’s participation in the BHP Xplor programme. The BHP initiative also provided funding for the recently undertaken seismic survey on the Kitlanya West project.
According to Cobre, the LoI reinforces the potential for its projects for hosting Tier 1 copper-silver deposits.
It also said that the partnership with BHP would offer the exploration scale and expertise to maximise the company’s chances of making new discoveries on its basin margin exploration ground.
Cobre will also maintain its 100% ownership of the Ngami and Okavango copper projects. These copper projects are omitted from the proposed transaction.
The Kitlanya West project spans the northern margin of the Kalahari Copper Belt while the Kitlanya East project is located immediately south of Sandfire Resources Motheo Production hub.
This year, the Botswana Department of Mines renewed licences for the Kitlanya East copper-silver project.
Cobre CEO Adam Wooldridge said: “Successful negotiation and completion of this significant transaction with BHP, one of the world’s leading mining companies, will be a major moment in time for Cobre as a company.
“Participating in the BHP 2024 Xplor cohort has provided the opportunity to do a belt scale review of the Kalahari Copper Belt, culminating with the collection of seismic data over the prospective northern margin of the belt.”
The deal is contingent upon the approval and the signing of formal binding definitive agreements and BHP’s completion of its due diligence investigations within the exclusivity period.
