Directors
Richard Nemis
Chairman Emeritus
Wesley (Wes) C. Hanson
President and Chief Executive Officer
Mr. Hanson was formerly Vice President Mine Development for Western Goldfields, before the recent announcement of its business combination with New Gold Inc. and he previously held the position of Vice President, Technical Services for Kinross Gold Corporation. Mr. Hanson has held several senior positions in the mining industry throughout his 25 year career, where he has been directly involved in the engineering construction and commissioning of numerous mining projects in Canada, the US, Brazil, Chile and Russia. Mr. Hanson has a Bachelor of Science, Geology from Mount Allison University in Sackville, New Brunswick, Canada.
Patrick Anderson
Director
Patrick F.N. Anderson is an exploration geologist, entrepreneur, and business executive with over 15 years of experience working for public and private mining and exploration companies. After graduating from the University of Toronto geology program, he moved to the jungles of southern Venezuela and worked as the resident project geologist on a successful exploration program. Since then, he has been a consulting geologist on gold, base metals and diamond projects for junior explorers, major producers and mineral industry consulting firms in South America, North America and Europe. Mr. Anderson was a Director, the President and CEO of Aurelian Resources Inc., a company of which he was one of the co-founders, prior to its takeover by Kinross Gold Corporation. Mr. Anderson currently sits on the boards of Colossus Minerals Inc., Noront Resources Ltd and U3O8 Corp Inc. He was named Mining Man of the Year by the Northern Miner in 2009 and received the Thayer Lindsley award for international discovery from the PDAC in 2008.
Darren Blasutti
Director
Mr. Blasutti is Senior Vice President, Corporate Development for Barrick Gold Corporation. He has played a key role in the implementation of strategic development opportunities and multiple acquisitions. Mr. Blasutti was previously at PricewaterhouseCoopers where he planned, supervised and managed audits for a variety of clients. He is a member of the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants.
Alex Davidson
Director
Mr. Davidson was formerly Executive Vice President, Exploration and Corporate Development with responsibility for Barrick Gold's international exploration programs and corporate development activities. Mr. Davidson joined Barrick in October 1993 as Vice President, Exploration with responsibility for the Company's expanding exploration program. He initiated Barrick's expansion out of North America and into Latin America and beyond. Prior to joining Barrick, Mr. Davidson was Vice President, Exploration for Metall Mining Corporation. Mr. Davidson has over 25 years' experience in designing, implementing and managing gold and base metal exploration and acquisition programs throughout the world. In April 2005, Mr. Davidson was presented the 2005 A.O. Dufresne Award by the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum to recognize exceptional achievement and distinguished contributions to mining exploration in Canada. In 2003, Mr. Davidson was named the Prospector of the Year by the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada in recognition for his team's discovery of the Lagunas Norte Project in the Alto Chicama District, Peru. He received his B.Sc. and his M.Sc. in Economic Geology from McGill University.
Joseph Hamilton
Chairman of the Board
Mr. Hamilton is a Professional Geologist with over 14 years of mineral exploration experience in addition to over seven years as a mining analyst in the investment industry and three years experience in mining development.
Mr. Hamilton is currently the President of Pickax International Corporation, a private company providing services to the mining industry. Mr. Hamilton is also the CFO of Malbex Resources Inc. a private company engaged in the exploration of minerals in South America. He was previously the Chief Executive Officer of African Copper plc.
Keith McKay
Director
Mr. McKay is a Chartered Accountant with extensive experience in the mining industry, including public company reporting requirements, financing, merger and acquisition transactions. Most recently, Mr. McKay was appointed Executive Vice President at Andina Minerals Inc.. Previously, he was Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Aurelian Resources Ltd, Senior Vice President Financial Operations with a international engineering and project management services firm and prior to that Controller with Rio Algom Ltd.
Paul Parisotto
Director
Mr. Parisotto, formerly President and Chief Executive Officer of Arizona Star Resource Corp. The company was acquired by Barrick Gold Corporation and Blacksands Petroleum, Inc. Blacksands owns a 75% interest in Access Energy, a private company of which Mr. Parisotto is also President and Chief Executive officer.
Mr. Parisotto has been President of Coniston Investment Corp. from October 1999 to the present. Coniston is a private firm specializing in providing investment banking services including the raising of equity and debt and providing mergers and acquisitions advisory services to small market capitalization companies which are either private or public.
He has also been Senior Vice-President, Corporate Finance for Marleau, Lemire Securities Inc. from January 1995 to January 1998 and was Vice-President and Director, Investment Banking for HSBC Securities (Canada) Inc. from March 1998 to June 1999. He was also director of Nevada Pacific Gold Ltd., a public company acquired by US Gold Inc. in a share exchange take over bid for over $100 million.
Prior to these current responsibilities, Mr. Parisotto was Manager, Original Listings at The Toronto Stock Exchange from 1985 to 1994. During his tenure at the TSE he was involved in the listing process for over 250 companies.
Lorie Waisberg
Director, ICD.D
Mr. Waisberg is currently a director of Chemtrade Logistics, Keystone North America, Metalex Ventures, Primary Energy Recycling Corporation and Tembec. Prior to retirement, he served as Executive Vice President of Co-Steel Inc. Mr. Waisberg has served on the board of approximately 15 Canadian public companies over the last ten years. For 30 years he practiced with and was a senior business law partner at Goodmans LLP.