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GREAT DIVIDE MINING LTD (GDM) - Transforming Abandoned Gold Mines into Profitable Ventures.

• Andrew Musgrave

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Breathing new life into Australia's forgotten gold mines is exactly what Great Divide Mining is mastering. CEO Justin Haines joins us to reveal the company's remarkable journey from IPO to imminent gold producer in under two years – a timeline that defies the industry's typical seven-year development cycle.

At the heart of Great Divide's strategy is a refreshingly practical approach: why spend millions searching for gold in untouched areas when you can revitalise sites where gold has already been discovered? Their flagship Challenger Gold Mine exemplifies this philosophy perfectly. With existing infrastructure, environmental approvals, and community relationships already in place, the team has fast-tracked the restart process and stands on the cusp of their first gold pour – a milestone that will automatically increase their stake from 15% to 51%.

The conversation takes us deep into the company's exploration successes at Devil's Mountain, where cutting-edge LiDAR technology has revealed over 480 historical workings spanning several kilometres. Rather than viewing these old diggings as depleted resources, Justin explains how the limitations of early miners – who could only extract shallow deposits – have left behind significant untapped potential perfect for modern mining methods.

Whether you're an investor interested in emerging producers or simply fascinated by innovative approaches to resource development, this episode offers valuable insights into how brownfield mining is changing the game. Subscribe to ASX Briefs for more conversations with the leaders transforming Australia's resource landscape.

Andrew Musgrave Host

Welcome back to ASX Briefs, where we speak with the leaders transforming Australia's listed companies in tomorrow's resource powerhouses. And today we're joined by Justin Haines, the CEO of Great Divide Mining Limited, an emerging gold, antimony and critical metals company focused on exploration and rapid transition to production. Justin, thanks for joining me today and welcome to the ASX Briefs podcast. 

Justin Haines Guest

Thanks, Andrew. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

Now, Justin, for investors that may be unfamiliar with Great Divide Mining, can you just provide a brief overview of the company? 

Justin Haines Guest

No problems. Well, great Divide Mining was we were set up in 2023 and we listed in August 2023. So, we're just less than two years old. We were set up to develop brownfield sites. So, you know, basically our philosophy is if gold's already been found in a place, well, why spend the extra money going looking for it elsewhere? So, we know the gold is where we find it. 

We can reduce exploration risks and, frankly, it takes us a lot less time and a lot less money to get a brownfield site back into production and it saves environmental yeah, a lot of environmental degradation. So, we can restart an existing site and we don't end up having to damage any further greenfield areas. So, we brought that into fruition. So, with the Adelong Venture, with Adelong Gold our partners, we're restarting the Challenger Gold Mine and it's a site that's been here since 1995. Had a few stops and starts, but there's a lot of gold here. There's already a plant here and we're now bringing that back to life. So, we'll be producing gold in the not-too-distant future. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

Okay then, and with the commissioning of the Challenger Gold Mine there, what have been the key enablers in fast tracking this restart? 

Justin Haines Guest

The resource is here. The site already has environmental, government, the local council approvals. It has social license to operate. It has an existing agreement with the traditional owners, so there's already a plant. So, it needed a bit of a touch-up. It's a little bit older and needed a bit of TLC. But we're just finalising that now. We've just started putting ore through it. So, it's, you know, really, it's been a six-month process for us to acquire the site and get it up and running, which is remarkably fast and certainly a lot less than you know, you look at the industry averages of, you know, seven years to get a mine started, that sort of stuff. Well, yeah, we'll be doing it in less than a year because a lot of those components already here.
 
 Andrew Musgrave Host


 
 Okay, and you're aiming to increase Great Divide's stake in Challenger Mines to 51% upon first gold pour, so what is the strategic importance does this milestone hold for Great Divide Mining?

Justin Haines Guest

Well, it’s a good question. We're sitting currently at 15% equity in Challenger Mines and we're also the mine operator. So going to first gold pour, we automatically go to 51%. We can then make good on our expansion plans for increasing production at the site and increasing the resource base at the site at the same time. So as a new entrant, as a new miner, it's going to be a pretty transformational sort of thing for Great Divide Mining so effectively, in something around two years since IPO, we'll have gone from a new listing as a junior to a new gold miner, which is pretty exciting. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

Okay, and the Devil's Mountain project has generated exciting results, with over 480 historical workings identified through LiDAR. So how do these findings reshape your exploration priorities? 

Justin Haines Guest

They probably don't reshape it, they're kind of confirming what we suspected to be there. So having spent a bit of time on the ground, we knew there was a lot of workings there. But being heavily treed you can miss a lot of those historical sites. So, using the LiDAR to see through the trees and it gives us a very, very accurate picture of all of those historical workings. So, the number of those workings is just amazing and it's refocusing us only insofar as, yeah, we don't bother looking at the further afield areas that haven't been looked at by those old-time miners. The old-time miners generally were quite shallow but laterally pretty extensive, so we know that they couldn't go very deep. So, we'll be extending drilling and other exploration in underneath those existing working. So, it's more just another feather. That or another. Another piece of the puzzle falls in a line that says yes, you're in the right place, keep going.

Andrew Musgrave Host

And the Ortts and Sawpit Creek Prospects look particularly promising, so what can you tell us about the scale and potential of these newly prioritised targets? 

Justin Haines Guest

The historical mining centres in that Kilkivan district. As far as striking extent goes, these things are several kilometres long each. So, when you add that to the Devil's Mountain prospect itself, which is seven and a half kilometres long, all within this one tenement, we've got some amazing strike lengths and amazing areas to bring back to life. These areas were mined all through the 1800s and early 1900s and there's a lot more life to give there. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

And you've recently farmed out the Coonambula project to Dart Mining. So how does this partnership support your broader development strategy and capital discipline? 

Justin Haines Guest

Yes, well, Coonambula, which is the local, the name of the main property in our exploration area. It has been a bit of a focus of the company because it's an antimoney plus gold project, but not gold with a little bit of antimoney, it's actually majority antimoney with a little bit of gold. So as a small company we can't focus on too many things at once. So, we've been bringing the Challenger Mine back online. We've had to put a lot of focus down here. We didn't want to have too many distractions, shall we say, and the partnership with Dart allows the very important exploration work to proceed at the Coonambula project. We still maintain a very strong interest in that project. We're working with Dart on the exploration planning where the drilling's going to go, future geophysical surveys and those sorts of things. So, it kind of allows us to hand over the reins without handing over the entirety of the project, and to ensure there's a good outcome for that project for our shareholders? 

Andrew Musgrave Host

Okay, and with exploration assets spread across five key projects, how are you prioritising resource allocation between near-term production and longer-term discovery? 

Justin Haines Guest

Our focus has always been to get into production as quickly as possible so that we'd be funding future exploration activities with cash flow from those producing assets. So, the projects are all staged in that way in that the, the most developed project obviously now is Challenger. The second most developed project was Devil's Mountain, the third was Yellow Jack, fourth Coonambula, fifth Cape. So, each one, as they come online from a mining perspective and cash flow perspective, will support the further exploration efforts. So, we are maintaining that same strategy, in that we are, Challengers coming online. 

We've taken Coonambula off the page out of our prime focus for the minute. We will be spending more time on Devil's Mountain this year. Yellow Jack we've kind of just put into hiatus a little bit for the minute, while it's never going to be a big enough project to support its own infrastructure. So, we're just waiting on our neighbours to catch up a little bit. There are some sites that are already there, that have already, that have historical mining, historical mining permits. So, they'll be able to have infrastructure on those sites more easily than we will. So, once they build their, their process plants, we'll be able to supply ore of them. So, we'll Yellow Jack will just sit there and wait for other people to catch up and obviously Cape that longer term quite a large exploration target there, but it's a longer lead time, so we will continue to stage those projects in that way. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

And now, looking at your role in the company, you've led GDM through its evolution from explorer to producer. So, what have been the biggest lessons you've learned during this transformation? 

Justin Haines Guest

I'm an operations person. I like being hands-on and working both on the exploration side, the project design and development side, and the operational phases. The big learning curve for me has been on the corporate side of things and obviously doing the marketing and all those sorts of things. So, the biggest learning for me has been that being an operational sort of person, delivering on your promises, means that the corporate side of things is far easier. GDM's always delivered on its promises. We don't over-promise and under-deliver. We under-promise and over-deliver wherever we possibly can and that's our sole focus is to just keep doing what we do and that's to hit those runs as we go. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

Okay, and to wrap things up for investors and prospective investors, what are some of the key milestones and goals you're looking to achieve over the next 12 months? 

Justin Haines Guest

Well, first gold from the Challenger Gold Mine and then ramp up a production to somewhere in the order of 20 or 25,000 ounces per annum. That will be in the next 12 to 24 months, which is obviously a pretty significant milestone. In that period, we're also hoping to then bring another operational site into play. So, we're looking to build our portfolio of operating assets quickly. Our focus isn't on size; it's on commerciality. So, we don't mind if it's a 5, 10, 20,000 ounce per annum site, as long as it's commercially viable to do it, we will. As our chairman keeps going, every time we bring a brown site project online or reopen a brownfield project, we preserve a piece of the natural environment. So, we'll keep doing that and we'll keep growing the company organically through reopening brownfield sites. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

Okay, Justin. Well, it's been great to speak today. We wish you all the best. So, thanks for your time and we look forward to further updates from Great Divide Mining in the upcoming months. 

Justin Haines Guest

Thanks very much, Andrew. 

Andrew Musgrave Host

That concludes this episode of ASX Briefs. Don't forget to subscribe and we look forward to catching you on our next episode.