Integra Gold Challenge with Rob McEwen, Sean Roosen, Brent Cook, Integra Gold & Top 5 Contestants!
Integra Gold owns the intellectual property on more than 6 terabytes of digital mining and exploration data, spanning more than 75 years of mining activity and 9 million ounces of gold production in Val-d’Or, Québec. Many millions of dollars has been spent by others acquiring this digital data – it’s now time to use it.
A prize of $1 Million is offered for successfully analyzing the supplied data and discovering a deposit of $5 Million ounces or greater. This is one of the largest mining industry focused Crowdsourcing analytical challenges ever created.
Palisade Radio had exclusive rights to interview the top people on the panel from Integra Gold who are judging the contest and also the five top finalists, the night before the event.
The competition has generated great publicity for Integra Gold and promises to uncover some very exiting new targets. The big rewards in the competition drives innovation in mining data analysis technology, for instance in artificial intelligence systems.
The price of gold is being driven higher amidst capital seeking safer havens in an uncertain economic environment. Gold mines globally are starting to create profits and this is reflected in the value of mining stocks.
Palisade Radio is brought to you by First Majestic Silver Corp., one of the world’s purest and fastest growing silver mining companies.
Palisade Radio Host, Collin Kettell: Welcome back to another episode of Palisade Radio. It is that time of year and mining investors are descending on Toronto for the annual PDAC conference. We are here at the Integra Gold Challenge. We are happy to be sitting down with Rob McEwen. He is, of course, the CEO of McEwen Mining. Our listeners might remember we had him on just a few weeks ago. Rob, welcome to the program.
Chief Executive Officer, McEwen Mining, Rob McEwen: Thank you. Glad to be here.
CK: I want to first talk to you about the idea of the Integra Gold Challenge. It was something that you had many years ago and you did it with the Goldcorp Gold Challenge. Tell us a little bit about how that came about and what the successes were that came out of that challenge?
RM: Well, it started with a question that I post to our chief geologist. I said, “How much more gold are we going to find in our mine?” We just made a big discovery and had grown for couple of years and just said how much more gold because we wanted to build a new mine processing plant. He said, “I do not know,” and I went, “That is a lousy answer.” Then I said, “How long is it going to take you to find out how much gold,” and he said, “I do not know.” I did not like that answer either. That was the start of a process where I said let us get a brainstorming session together and bring all our geologists into the room and have them sit down for two days and talk about the ideas they have not shared and also the ideas their bosses had shot down.
The first presenter was someone I called up after I made the head of exploration sit down because he was going at it in a conventional way. I asked the person who I knew had some differing opinions to come up and talk about the last ideas boss shot down. There was this big arc of electricity that went across the room between the boss and him and it was basically saying, “You say that, you are fired.” You pick up the tension and you go, “Well, I want to change rules and I am going to say the first person who threatened someone else with being fired is fired.” That opened up the door.
After two days everybody ran out of the room, all sorts of ideas have been shared. There was a lot of energy and I started thinking we should do this again but on a larger scale. We should invite our retired geologists. We should invite government geologists who know the area. We should invite our competition next door. It is a seed and it is working away and it is germinating. Then at one point I went, “There is on every continent there is a similar geological setting so there should be expertise there but how do we get to them?” I ended up going to a course at MIT in Boston on information technology for a totally different purpose. I was trying to figure out how we push the mining industry from the 19th century into the 21st century. On the second day right after lunch they started talking about Linux, and open source code, and I went, “Ah, there it is.” So a light bulb went off and I said there is a template we should use to communicate this question to the world.
I came back home and we took fifty years of data, geological data. We created a very extensive of bibliography in additional to that, worked with a software company called Gemcom so we could take their database and have it in two and three dimensions. We threw it up on the web and we said to the world, “Tell us where we will find the next six million ounces of gold in our mine and we will give you prizes totaling half a million dollars.” That was the start. We spent half a million dollars setting it up, half a million dollars in prize money, and we found $3 billion dollars worth of gold.
CK: The idea here with the entire gold challenge is, of course, very similar in that you spend some money, get a lot more mines together, and hopefully discover a lot more gold. Why are not more companies are doing this, Rob?
RM: Part of it is timing. You have to find a time when people in the industry have extra time. When we did it we launched it in 2000. That was at the bottom of the gold cycle; gold was at a 20-year low. There were all sorts of excess capacity, intellectual capacity. People were not fully employed so they could put their mind to this problem statement. There were two attempts. BHP tried it several years after us. I consulted with them and they took 150 years of data that was in file boxes, digitized it, and threw up on the web seven terabytes of data which is a massive file. They invited people to come in and joint venture some of these properties. 1) It was at a time they wanted too much to get the joint venture, and 2) There had been a lot of money starting to come into the industry and so people were not as readily available. After that they came very fully employed in actually shorter time. We are now at another lull in the cycle when there is a lot of excess capacity so it is an ideal time to do it.
CK: You would know better than anybody how the competition today is looking to shape up. Obviously, you have already looked at many of the results that have come in and tomorrow night there is going to be announced the winner. What do you think the success has been for Integra on this? Is it going to match up to Goldcorp?
RM: Well, they have a lot more people behind it. There are many other sponsors. When we did it we were basically doing it with ourself and with Gemcom. But here they have the software providers. They have IBM. They have a number of brokerage firms, banks, and IBM, and so other suppliers all creating a bigger moment.
I think from a standpoint the Integra name as Goldcorp’s name gets pushed around the world by using today’s technology to apply it to an old industry that many people do not see a future in. They will definitely have targets that they are going to execute on. They will probably see someone start up these mines again. I am quite sure of that and they will have a much better path to develop a larger resource and an economic activity in Val-d’Or.
CK: One last question for you, Rob. We talked to you about three or four weeks ago. I just mentioned the lull in the market. There has been a huge shift. Money started rushing into the sector. A lot of people we have talked to have said the bottom is definitely in. But people want to hear the voices that count, and your voice certainly counts. Is the bottom in? McEwen Mining is up over 100%. That is great to hear.
RM: It feels like we are probably past the bottom. In the last month we have seen the US dollar starting to weaken and that to me was one of the key ingredients. I think when we spoke the last time I mentioned from 2001 to 2005 gold was going up in dollar terms, but most other currencies it was flat. Post 2005 it started going up in all currencies and that brought a flood of money into the sector. People wanted to be investing in gold, silver, and other mining stocks.
We have somewhat to the inverse of that happening since the highs were reached for gold in 2011. Sept 2011 gold was over $1900 an ounce. Since then gold has gone in one direction in dollar terms and that has been going down, and it dropped 45%. But in the last year to year and a half gold has been going up in other currencies. You may remember I mean we had the Canadian dollar was par with the US dollar back in 2011. Well, right now even though gold, say, $1250, Canadian terms it is 10% off its old high. The same thing is happening in Australia. The same thing is happening in South Africa. The mines that are there are cash flowing in a way that no one could believe and they are going to be kicking off profits, and that is what people are seeing right now.
In the last month we have seen gold starting to turn up in dollar terms and that is attracting the money in. If you think of the market, think of the gold price as being a spring and someone has pushed it down 45%, and when you take the pressure off it is starting to move back up again. The gold stocks fell almost twice as far as gold fell in most cases and there is no selling going on. The people who want to sell and thought it was a lousy investment have long got out of it. There has been big turnover in the investors and the people that are in now the majority do not want to sell. It is all supply and demand. There is limited supply and the demand is small but growing and that has had explosive results.
You could look across the junior index and most of them had doubled. I mean if you looked at Barrick it is up 100% since October. You could look at Core Mining which was a heavily indebted silver producer in the last month it has almost tripled. If you are getting 1% yield on your money market instrument or you are getting a 5% dividend in one area, or you are getting beat up in biotech and in technology and you are saying, “What is going on here that there is so much money suddenly being made in the metal industry?” People will start looking at it and saying, yes, the money supply has expanded around the world. The debt levels are huge. There is a little bit of political strife going on in different corners of the world and the banking system, they are starting to talk about derivatives. You look at the economy and it has not recovered despite the massive infusion of capital.
People are saying, “All right if someone is going charge a negative interest rate on my bank account that means I am going to put money in the bank and I have to pay the bank to keep the money there? I might as well buy gold.” I mean it is moving up and I think those factors are contributing to the movement in the price of gold. Last year we saw January 15 there were 20 days of positive movement in the market and then it faded. Right now we have gone for two months and just we are just entering March. There is some seasonality so maybe you do not want to put all your money in right away because there is a lull. But this feels like we are at a bottom and we are going higher.
CK: All right, fantastic Rob. Thank you so much for coming back on the show in such short time period and best of luck tomorrow night.
RM: Thank you very much and its to the contestants.
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CK: We just spoke to Rob McEwen. We now have Sean Roosen who is the CEO of Osisko Gold Royalties sitting with us. Sean, a real pleasure to have you on the show.
SR: Well, it is great to be here. I think this is a very exciting thing for the industry and for Val-d’Or.
CK: Oh, that is right. Of course, we are talking about the Integra Gold Challenge here. Tomorrow night the results come out of who the winner is; big amount of money for those people. But the more exciting thing is the discovery that might be coming under way here. We were just talking and you were saying how exciting that the region is based on the proximity to discoveries that you have made in the past and wealth that has been created from that.
SR: Oh, absolutely! We had a great success with Canadian Malarctic which is now Canada’s largest gold producer and has created several billion dollars of wealth for shareholders; $4 billion when we sold it, but it has contributed hugely to the economy, contributed to the development of Quebec and the development of the mining industry in Canada. We are hoping that the Integra challenge really brings that next big discovery and wealth creation for everybody.
CK: Sean, you have been called a shark on the panel here listening to the findings of the different groups. It is down to five finalists. What do you think the caliber of information these people have been uncovering? Do you think there is going to be a lot of value that comes out of this for Integra?
SR: Well, I think that we are on the next leg of the technology evolution. We used it to our advantage when we did the Canadian Malarctic discovery. That was a similar process to this but the power of the technology and the new processes, the artificial intelligence available, it has proved that this is an industry that is ripe for innovation. People are doing it and this is the kind of thing that is going to explain to everybody what are these we do in the gold business. We are innovators and we do want to see the next generation of technology and the next generation of young people that really come together and make this work and deliver some value for our communities and for our country.
CK: Sean, you have been one of the biggest and most prominent names of the mining industry over the last few years and part of that is your ability to defy the cycles and create value in good and in bad times and finance, of course, and be able to market companies. But the cycle is always king in mining. We have seen a change of tides the last three or four weeks. Money started to rush back in. Some people are not convinced yet. We just asked Rob and he seemed pretty convinced that the bottom was behind us. What are your thoughts on the market condition as we go into PDAC?
SR: Well, I have never been one to waste a bad market. We have certainly tried to take advantage of the conditions as they were out of the past and make sure that it was good work getting done. I think that if we can get a little firmness in the gold price it would be very good for everybody. I think we have had a good couple months here. We have seen some evolution so hopefully we will attract some capital back into the gold space and mining in general. But I think that it kind of feels like we are firming up and hopefully we have been on a down cycle coming up on four years that we finally come out the other side of it. I am hopeful for everybody to see some progress and see some markets that we can work with.
CK: All right, last question for you. On Osisko Gold Royalty, what can you tell our listeners about what is going on over there?
SR: Well, Osisko Gold Royalty is in 20 months we have done over a billion dollars in transactions with the acquisition of Virginia. We have got $450 million of cash in the bank and another $200 million of acquisition facilities. We have about $650 million to deploy into the marketplace. We are very active on that front. We also have associated companies such as Oban and Falco and Barkerville where we have deployed capital and we are looking for new developments, new discoveries to come forth through that model.
We have been one of the biggest explorers in Quebec and Ontario NBC though our subsidiary companies throughout the down cycle. We always believe that all wealth is created at the drill bit mining. It is just a de-risking operation. We have been able to keep our team rolling throughout the cycle and we are ready to take advantage of the next uptick, and we are creating new opportunities every day. It is a very exciting time for us and we are working harder than we ever have.
CK: All right, Sean. Thank you so much. I hope you have an enjoyable time tomorrow night and the rest of PDAC and I hope for a good 2016.
SR: Absolutely! 2016 looks like a pretty good year so far.
CK: That it does. Thank you so much.
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CK: We just spoke with Rob McEwen and Sean Roosen. We now have George Salamis here as the chairman of Integra Gold. George, welcome on the program.
GS: Good afternoon, Collin.
CK: George, I want to talk to you from the standpoint of an investor with Integra the benefit that the investors are going to see out of this challenge, the money that was being paid out. Obviously it was a huge success for Goldcorp back in the day when they did it.
GS: I think top of the list would be all the great ideas that will come out of this. Our team has already reviewed a number of these submissions that come through this by way of this challenge that we ran. They are already starting to see some phenomenal things; things that they would have never seen themselves or would have taken a very long time to get to see. The IRR on what this contest means to them is immense.
CK: Yeah, and I guess the concept there is the more eyes that are on the data the better. There is so much that can be missed and so many different interpretations that can be made. I guess, first of all, stepping back a second, all the data that was compiled from the different teams that is all acquired by Integra so you are not only getting the winning group’s data but you really get to analyze a whole different set of eyes on the program there.
GS: Oh, absolutely! That is a question that comes up often is how do these top five finalists compared to the rest of the other 95 submissions that we got? Amongst the other 95 there were some phenomenal ideas as well. It will be literally years sifting through all these ideas. We already are geared up to start testing some of these ideas almost immediately post competition, but we have got ammunition for the next couple of years certainly.
CK: That is great. You said you are already starting to look at things you are going to do. I guess the truest test of that always is sticking a drill bit into a new area. That is the most exciting, the biggest way to get a share jump. Do you think that you already have, coming out of this, some drill ready targets that you are going to have to go with?
GS: Yeah, one of the things that we asked for in this competition was for specific targets. Not sort of nebulous ideas, but specific where would you stick a drill type X,Y,Z coordinate cut type stuff. A lot of the targets are drill ready. They are close to infrastructures. They are close to roads. They are accessible so we could get to drilling those very, very quickly after the competition.
CK: Yeah, well what an exciting way to start PDAC this year. The last time this challenge was done was I think 10 or 15 years ago. It was a huge success and I am hoping for Integra the same success. George, thank you so much for adding to this piece and coming on the show. It has been a pleasure to have you.
GS: Awesome! Great! Thank you.
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CK: We are back now with one of the other sharks, one of the other judges on the panel for the Integra Gold Challenge that is Brent Cook. We have had him on the program before. He is, of course, with Exploration Insights, www.explorationinsights.com. Brent, thank you so much for coming back on the show.
BC: Good to be here on another PDAC.
CK: Yeah, well, without going off topic this year seems like it might be a little more upbeat than the last couple of years.
BC: I am encouraged. It is the first time I had been for four years, but I am encouraged. I think we have hit bottom.
CK: Yeah, and I remember I interviewed you last year and you said 2015 was going to be a slow on, but 2016 is one that might start. Good job on the timing there. On to the challenge, we have asked some of the other people we have talked to – Rob and Sean – what they see as the benefit of this challenge for Integra Gold and for the industry. Starting off, what do you see is the benefit?
BC: Certainly, for Integra, they have outsourced several terabytes of data to the world. It interests me because when you have got seven terabytes of data your biggest problem is how to get rid of most of it. They have had other people doing that. What they go down to is a group of experts, technical experts, who have managed to pull the data they felt was the best out of that and come up with some interesting targets that hopefully have not been tested and hopefully will turn out a discovery. I think that is fantastic in that respect. In terms of the industry, this is great for the industry. We are just coming out of the bottom and these people who got their name into the final five this will be great for their career.
CK: Now how are you going about— obviously there are seven terabyte of data. You can only hear so much from each group. How do you go about judging and picking a winner tomorrow?
BC: We are fortunate that we have had a technical committee go through and whittle down how many entries that we are down to five. That technical committee has most of the input as to what call, who wins. The sharks or titans, I guess, they are calling us are going to judge based on the data as presented, the ideas, the clarity of the presentation, the enthusiasm. That is our input into it so we are judging on that by and large to make a decision.
CK: I know you have only seen so much. You said the technical committee had seen most of it. But from what you have seen does this look like a worthwhile endeavor for Integra and are they going to have drill ready targets coming out of this event here?
BC: Without a doubt this is a smart thing for them. They are spending probably a million and a half total with the funds and the work behind it. They are going to get some targets that they certainly would not have thought of before. Interesting thing is going to be what I would do. I suspect they will take the targets from a number of these different groups and see how they line up and see how many targets are actually the same between different methodologies and those are going to be really prime targets. I have no doubt they are going to find more mineralization.
CK: All right, Brent, we will have you back on in a couple of months, but just one last quick question for you. Investors right now they have already seen a lot of these stocks jump quite a bit. What interest you the most coming the next three or four years if this is indeed the beginning of a new bull market? What are yo u looking for to make spectacular gains?
BC: The interesting thing to me is that we are producing more mine production: cooper, gold, especially gold, then refining. That has been going for a while. In terms of gold, we are producing, say, 90 million ounces. We are finding on average 45 million in a year. That gap is going to get really, really interesting. There is a pinch point coming where these major mining companies for every ounce they mine they have got to replace. They are not replacing it. To me it is the early stage discoveries that these major mining companies are going to have to buy down the road. That is really the sexy part of this industry right now.
CK: Well, it looks to be a good 2016, a good PDAC. Brent, thank you so much for coming back on the program with us.
BC: Thanks. Hope to do it again.
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CK: We are finishing up here with our last interview today with Stephen de Jong. He is the CEO of Integra Gold. Of course much of what is going into this Integra Gold Challenge has been his idea, his doing. We want to welcome you on the program, Steve.
SJ: Thank you so much for having me.
CK: From everybody we have talked to so far, we have talked to Rob McEwen and Sean Roosen and Brent Cook. They think this is a fabulous idea. It is going to return a lot of value for shareholders and for management on the project. How do you feel coming up to the final night of the competition? How has this worked out so far?
SJ: So far it has been great. This is the night before. There are still a lot of things that we have to do. Sort of a little nervous, very optimistic, very excited about what is going to happen. Tomorrow is a big night for us to get up there. We have seen the submissions already or the submissions have gone through, so a lot of it is more to showcase what we are doing to the entire industry.
We have got 400 people from buy side, sell side, corporate, from the gold industry, from the resource industry that are going to be there. Presented some new ideas in explorations, some more ways to look at it, but I think more important than that, new ideas and new ways on how we approach exploration in general; working together to come up to share ideas. It is going to lead hopefully to some new discoveries.
CK: When you started this competition a few months ago the market was certainly not good. Some people might have questioned why do expend this kind of capital in doing a competition like this? With the market turning, I think a lot of these worries are going to go away. But not only are you getting all these eyes on the project, all these different perspectives on what might be under the ground, huge marketing that is going on for Integra Gold with this. It seems like it is going to work out in more ways than one. In terms of the submissions that you have gotten so far do you think you have drill ready targets that are in place for when this is over?
SJ: Actually, just before I answer your question a little bit about kind of the money and the resources and the capital that we put into this. It is really how you approach it, it is a return on investment. A good example is two years ago we bought a mill that was bankrupt and had a big environmental liability tied to it. We bought that mill and the same day that we bought it we sold 60% of that environmental liability which was the waste rock to a big construction company for a million dollars cash. We only had a $1.8 million cash payment to make with this mill.
There are real opportunities that create themselves within this market and the million dollar cash prize we are able to go out and raise through sponsors of the challenge because of all the publicity it generated. The bulk of that was actually raised through sponsorships to the challenge. We are getting this great PR, this great exposure. This event tomorrow night is going to bring in $250,000 to local charities in the community that we operate in and it is actually not that big of an expense to the company.
As far as drill ready targets go, there are a number of targets we are really excited about. It will be great to get up and see some of those presenters, some of those ideas up on stage. We are really looking forward to within a few weeks compiling that data, put our exploration plan together, and get out there and attack those targets. We have nine drills turning right now. It is one of the busiest programs out there. It is not a big deal for us to add a tenth or take one of those drills and start testing some of these very exciting targets.
CK: Yeah, I have talked to some of the other— Rob McEwen and Sean Roosen about the market turning in 2016. Integra has done a very good job of continuing to move forward and raise capital and drill even in a bad market. But, certainly, this has to change things a bit. How are you seeing interest in the sector and interest in Integra Gold picking up over the last few weeks, is it encouraging?
SJ: It is very encouraging. As a company, we have a motto in our office where we say, “Treat every day like it is the end of the rally.” Because if the market keeps going, which we believe it will and we think it will, we are going to do great from that. But we still have to, as a company, strategize and prepare for the worst.
Over the last few years if you look at 2015, one of the worst years for gold companies coming off a 2 or 3 year downtrend, Integra is up 74%. The last few weeks, the last, say, six weeks on this market has been great. We are not dependent so much on the price of gold, whereas I think we have shown the market if we just execute on our strategy we’ve got a high grade project that can survive a wide range of gold prices, we will continue to see interest in the story.
CK: Last question for you. I know this is pure speculation, but any indication of how much gold do you guys think is on that project?
SJ: I think I will get in a lot of trouble if I answer that question. I would say what is really encouraging is we have taken over a hundred submissions and we are going to see five of them tomorrow. But we had a lot of targets show up that there are a few of targets that showed up in multiple submissions, ten plus submissions, and some were using computer science artificial intelligence, machine learning algorithms. Others are using pure geology based on a team with 150 years of experience. It is very encouraging for us when we see that for multiple teams to come up with the exact same untested target. That is where we are most encouraged about. That is where we think the highest probability of a big gold discovery. How much is there? I think we will have to wait and see.
CK: All right, Stephen, thank you so much for coming on the program. It has been a pleasure having you on.
SJ: Thank you very much. Thanks for having me.
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CK: This is Collin Kettell with Palisade Radio. We are here at the Integra Gold Challenge. We are talking to some of the finalists of the challenge. We will have the reveal happening tomorrow, Sunday, night at the beginning of PDAC. We are sitting here talking to Paul Pearson. He is one of the finalists. He has entered as an individual. Paul, can you please give us a bit about your background?
PP: Hi. I am an exploration geologist and also a structural geologist. I have been in the industry for about 30 years. I worked all over Australia and all over Latin America. I love greenstone terrains. This is the sort of rocks that you find Sigma-Lamaque in. I am really excited to be able to present my ideas to the shark tank tomorrow.
CK: Fantastic! Paul, how do you go about looking for the extension of the previous deposit or why do you think that you against the other groups might be able to find something that the other groups will not be able to find?
PP: I bring long experience in these sorts of terrains, structural analysis related to ore deposits, and extremely meticulous approach: section by section, level plan by level plan, modeling of the geology together with Leapfrog. I think I have recognized structures and controls in the mineralization using that experience to find some really exciting targets very close to Lamaque.
CK: All right, great! Final question: what is your hypothesis at the end of your studies here, what are your findings? Do you think there is a lot of gold there?
PP: Absolutely! I think there is a huge potential very close to Lamaque. Whatever the outcome tomorrow I hope the company runs with my ideas because I think that represents an enormous opportunity, add value to their portfolio and to their general bottom line.
CK: All right, Paul, best of luck tomorrow night.
PP: Thanks very much.
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CK: We are sitting down with the second contestant now. He is JP Paiement with SGS Geostat. JP, welcome on the program.
JP: Thanks.
CK: Yeah, it must be quite a boiler room in there. You are getting ready for tomorrow night. You are one of the finalists. Congratulations on that. What is it that you see that the project has merit at this point? You have done obviously quite a bit of work, months of work at this point. Hopefully you are the winner. But do you think the project has merit?
JP: The full project merit will be first of all we worked a full month, right. Then I guess the main takeaway for us just being top five is really good exposure. We pushed more of the science stuff. We were able to develop some new exploration techniques and stuff like that, so that was an awesome takeover for us. We are not that we brought home and, yeah, maybe bringing home half a million dollar would be pretty cool for our company. But mostly for us it is just a matter of getting our names out there, getting our names as expert, and really pushing the limits of what can be done with science regarding exploration work.
CK: Tell us a little bit more about the methods that you used. What differentiates you from the other groups that are up on the stage tomorrow?
JP: It is pretty hard for me to say what is sort of different about us because I have no idea what the other guys did. But on our side what we did is we tried to divide the space into cells so just take the whole property and all the way up to 2km deep. We divided that into equal size blocks and all the blocks had different information in them regarding the geology, the gold grades, the structures that are near, all of that. All of the exploration criteria that we deemed useful to find gold were fed into that block model and then we could filter through it and find hotspots for exploration so we could find volumes, targets, and actual tangible targets that we could plan to drill holes. It is super easy to use and it can update itself.
After we did that we fed the model to Doug which is our machine learning expert. What he did is kind of validate our model using machine learning, so instead of a human trying to find correlation the computer did all of that by itself, predicted the probability of having ore in each block, and then we use that as a vetting process for our target. If we had a target with a machine learning good score and just a geological base knowledge good score, we thought that was a really riskless target it is really worth drilling. If target came in with the A.I. or the machine learning stuff by itself, then it was more riskier if it just came off with the geological knowledge. We classify it as more risky.
The other thing is that the model then can be updated with whatever drilling you do. Even if you miss the targets, if you do not catch mineralization, all the information that you get by drilling can be fed back into the model, rerun and updated, and maybe the targets are going to move around a bit. You might have missed them but at least the information you gathered by drilling is out full through the time. That is a pretty cool thing we have.
CK: All right, fantastic, JP. Thank you so much for coming on the show and best of luck tomorrow night.
JP: Yeah, thank you very much. We will see what goes down tomorrow I guess.
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CK: All right, we are sitting here with the third contestant, Andy Wilde. He is with the group of six called The GoldCrushers. Andy, tell us a little bit about the group you put it together for the competition.
AW: Well, if I had to sum it up I would say experience. Between the six of us we have 130 years of collective experience in the industry. We also have a diversity of backgrounds. We grew up English, Australian, Ghanaian. I think that is about it, geologists and geophysicists.
CK: Going into the competition there are loads of data for you to comb through. The winner, of course, can be the people that go through it the best and figure out the best techniques to find what is under the ground. What is a little bit about how you guys went about it?
AW: Without wishing to give too much away, we adopted a slightly a different view to that. But I really do not want to tell you too much because my opposition is out there. We have a different way of looking at it. It is not about data necessarily that there is a lot of potential at Sigma-Lamaque. But I think I do not want to say anything more about that.
CK: Fair enough and there is fierce competition indeed. What is your group of six going to do if you win the half million dollars?
AW: First of all jump up and down and drink lots of champagne. To be honest we have not thought that far. We are just happy to be here and take full advantage of the opportunity that Integra have given us.
CK: Great! Well, we are at PDAC. It will be a great time to jump up and down and drink champagne. Andy, thank you so much for coming on the show and best of luck tomorrow night.
AW: Thank you very much.
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CK: We are talking to the fourth contestant now. His name is Craig Hart. He is with GoldRX. The other member of the team, Sara Jenkins, is also sitting here. Craig, tell us a little bit about your background and why you decided to enter into the challenge?
CH: The group that we represent is the Mineral Deposit Research Unit at the University of British Columbia. We have developed expertise and know how about this sort of approach. This was a terrific opportunity for us to have the opportunity to raise our profile and show the world the skills that we have in this direction.
CK: Tell me a little bit about the process you guys used from the beginning without giving away any trade secrets on how you went through all the data and the different techniques you have developed.
CH: Yeah, no real trade secrets here. We were very pragmatic. We had a tremendous amount of data. We need to figure out what was the useful data and what was not useful, and then once we had the good stuff we went ahead with it and made it better. The opportunity to add value to the existing data sets and then integrate it all at the end to give us a defined target, that was the process; very straightforward.
CK: After review how much gold do you think is under the ground there?
CH: You know when we look at the big property that they have there are still multimillion ounces existing there. I am very confident. There are targets that we can see all over the place. The one that we are presenting is just what we think best represents the challenge which was to find a bigger deposit, higher grade that is cost effective and exploitable.
CK: Fantastic! And you guys are smart; there is only two of you. The last group had six which means the money has to be split many more ways. What do you guys do with the money?
CH: We are not in it for the money. We are just in it for the opportunity to get the visibility and profile. But I am sure we can find some good things to do with that, maybe even investing in Integra because the resource there is going to last them for many, many years.
CK: All right, Craig, thank you so much for coming on and best of luck tomorrow.
CH: My pleasure.
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CK: We are here with the fifth and final contestant for the gold challenge. We are talking with Vincent with Data Miners. His partner Antoine is also here. Vincent, welcome on the program.
VD: Hi, Collin.
CK: Yup, I want to ask you first off what is it that your group has that differentiates you from the other final four contestants?
VD: Well, first of all we are unique. We think outside of the box. We bring innovative method to an industry like we bring innovation.
CK: Tell me a little bit about both of your backgrounds.
VD: Well, we are students. I am a Masters student and Antoine is a Ph.D. student. We both study in Quebec City.
CK: What is the finding of your months and months of research here? Do you think there is a lot of gold under the ground there?
VD: Sure, there is. There is lots of gold. What is really important is not the gold, but the gold is really important but it is also the method. We are revolutionizing everything there.
CK: Well, certainly winning the prize tomorrow night would be a great thing for your career and your name, also a huge chunk of money. What would two students do with half a million dollars?
VD: Well, it depends. We are six so half a million is good, but six students, we will split that. Probably do some fun stuff but mostly invest for the future, maybe Integra. Integra could be a very good investment.
CK: Fantastic! Thank you so much for coming on the show. I wish you the best of luck tomorrow night, Vincent.
VD: Thank you, Collin.
Integra Gold Corp (TSX Venture: ICG; OTCQX: ICGQF) is a Canadian company focused on the exploration of its high-grade Lamaque South project in one of Canada’s premier gold producing districts, the “Valley of Gold,” Val-d’Or, Québec. The Lamaque South property is divided into three clusters, the North, South and West cluster. The primary targets are the high-grade Parallel Zone in the North Cluster and the Triangle Zone in the South Cluster. The acquired Sigma Mill, located 1 kilometer from the Parallel Zone and 3 kilometers from the Triangle Zone, is a fully-permitted, 2,200 ton per day mill and tailings facility. The Sigma-Lamaque Mill and Mining Complex include the historic Sigma and Lamaque Mines which operated for 75 and 52 years respectively and produced more than 9 million ounces of gold in total.
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