Can you tell us about the origins of VerAI Discoveries and your vision for the company?
VerAI is a disruptive AI-based mineral asset generator that changes how the world discovers mineral deposits. We formed VerAI in 2020 to tackle the biggest challenge of mineral exploration – finding concealed mineral deposits under covered terrain. The green energy transition needs enormous quantities of metals, but the low-hanging fruits are already gone, and the mining industry is falling short of discovering new resources to supply the massive demand. As vast areas of the mining countries are completely covered, the conventional exploration model is not effective, not economically viable, and not scalable. Today's success rate of exploration projects is extremely poor, with less than 1 in 1,000 deposits becoming a mine, while in covered terrain the performance is even lower. There is a US$100 billion opportunity to disrupt the industry by providing high-probability targets in underexplored covered areas. VerAI is not providing a service or selling its technology; instead, we are generating significant value by using our technology to build a portfolio of mineral assets and develop them with partners. We have a very capital-efficient and scalable business model with a broad and diversified portfolio of multiple commodities in various jurisdictions.
What mining, investment and technology experience does the team behind VerAI Discoveries have?
VerAI founders and core team members are rooted in the Israeli Defense Intelligence and Hi-Tech domains. During the last decade, as senior executives in mineral exploration companies in Chile and the US, we have been implementing our knowledge and expertise to significantly improve the success rate of mineral discoveries. We led R&D programs and global field operations of multidisciplinary teams that specialized in innovative solutions to solve complex exploration problems. VerAI's strong Discovery Team is built on the synergy between three essential pillars: data science, geoscience, and commercial expertise – all supported by a tier-one experienced Advisory Team and Board of Directors from the fields of academic research and the mining industry.
How does VerAI Discoveries' Artificial Intelligence (AI) Platform detect concealed mineral deposits?
Most exploration companies look only for proxies or conditions for a mineral deposit, such as favorable host rocks, structures, and alterations. VerAI, on the other hand, deploys a novel proprietary AI technology, utilizing tailor-made datasets and an exclusive catalog of patterns from existing economic ore bodies in order to identify, with a high level of probability, the location of new economically viable mineral deposits. Our AI-based discovery platform successfully targets concealed deposits of various commodities, including Cu, Mo, Zn, Au, Co, and Ni. We believe that the next significant economic discoveries will be in the underexplored covered terrain, which is where we are focusing our technology and innovation efforts.
Can you tell us about your work with Pampa Metals in Chile?
Our partnership with Pampa Metals covers targets across eight property blocks, 100% owned by VerAI and totaling about 18,700 Ha in the Paleocene mineral belt of northern Chile. The Cu, Au and Ag targets identified by our discovery platform are very proximal to the operating mines of Guanaco and El Penon in the north and the large Casualidad project in the south. The Agreement grants Pampa the right to explore VerAI's properties with an exclusivity period of up to 12 months, with an investment of US$500,000. If Pampa Metals select a block as a designated project for development, it has the option to acquire 51% of the project, subject to a further exploration investment of US$1 million over two years, and 75% by completing a NI-43-101 compliant Preliminary Economic Assessment over the following two years.
How do you intend to grow the business in the years ahead?
We already have five portfolios of projects in the pipeline, targeting critical metals in Arizona, Nevada, Chile, and Peru. VerAI has announced its first exploration partnership in its portfolio in Northern Chile and has signed another agreement to develop an extensive portfolio in Peru. We have recently started developing a new portfolio in Ontario, Canada focusing on Cu, Au, Ni, and Co, and we are planning a new Li portfolio in North America. VerAI is in advanced discussions with several groups of Majors and Juniors that expressed interest in partnering with us on our portfolios in Arizona, Nevada and Chile.
