Joseph Keane

Independent Director

Mr. Keane has held numerous engineering, technical, and managerial positions in the mineral industry worldwide, including positions with Chile Exploration Company in Chile, Molycorp in New Mexico, and Pincock, Allen & Holt. Previously, Mr. Keane was President and Principal Metallurgical Engineer with KD Engineering Co., specializing in process design development, equipment selection, and pollution abatement for global clients. Concurrently, he served as President of METCON Research, supervising numerous mineral beneficiation test programs and pilot plant studies. SGS, a global analytical and engineering services firm, acquired both KD and METCON in 2013, renaming the combined companies SGS Metcon/KD Engineering.

Mr. Keane has served as a director of Golden Cycle Gold Corporation, Rochester Resources, Mercator Minerals, Norsemont Mining Inc. and Stingray Copper Corporation. For a period of fifteen years, he was a consultant to the Mining & Petroleum Division of IMF (International Finance Corp), a division of the World Bank.

Notably, Mr. Keane participated in the engineering design and construction of the first semi-autogenous copper sulfide flotation mill in the Philippines and the doubling of the production capacity of the largest gold mine in that Southeast Asian country. In addition, he was the project sponsor for the design of China's largest gold heap leach mine (initial ore capacity was 30,000 tonnes per day and expected production was 133,000 ounces gold per year) in Inner Mongolia, which was subsequently acquired by China Gold International. The mine has been expanded and projected gold production for 2020 is estimated at 212,000 ounces.