TNG rebrands as Tivan with new management vows to revive Mount Peake project

The future of a proposed multi-billion dollar mine hangs in the balance pending an internal review. Read what’s at stake.

Critical miner TNG Limited has a new name and a new board of directors after several years of turmoil threatened to derail the company and its cornerstone Mount Peake project.

At an extraordinary general meeting in Melbourne last month, 99.3 per cent of shareholders endorsed the election of major shareholder Grant Wilson as executive chairman and approved a corporate name change to Tivan Limited, pending approval by regulators.

Speaking at the EGM, Mr Wilson warned investors the company’s future and the multi-billion dollar vanadium-titanium-iron Mount Peake mine are in the balance.

He said a priority of the new management team would be to “reset, review and renew” the organisation, including a review of the Mount Peake project.

Tivan (formerly TNG) executive chairman Grant Wilson at January 2023 extraordinary general meeting in Melbourne.

The review is expected to be completed by the end of next month.

Mr Wilson said it was appropriate the reset began with the board, which he said had been a “revolving door”.

He said TNG had “totally disengaged” from key stakeholders in government and financial circles.

“I held a view from the outside that if really significant change didn’t happen there was a 100 per cent likelihood that the company would fail and that failure would be ignominious, an unprincipled failure,” he said.

“My view is if change hadn’t occurred and hadn’t been as direct and comprehensive as it was, the company would have failed at some point or other.

“The board has been reset in the hardest way possible. This is not a cosmetic change, it’s the hardest reset possible in terms of board culture.”

Mr Wilson said the company’s cost culture “wasn’t as bad as I was expecting” and identified broadening the shareholder base and sharing the risk as priorities.

“There was certainly a scenario where you’d get through the process and turn the lights off,” he said.

Tivan (formerly TNG) new branding adopted at January 2023 extraordinary general meeting in Melbourne.

He signalled a future capital raising contingent on completion of the review.

“Capital raising will be necessary as it is for everyone in this sector,” he said.

“The real trick is to make sure you’ve got management that understands capital management frameworks and it is managing capital efficiently.”

The multi-billion dollar Mt Peake mine project has federal and NT major project status and, if it goes ahead, could create 1200 construction jobs and more than 400 permanent jobs when operational.

TNG was targeting production of 6000 tonnes a year of high-purity vanadium pentoxide from Mount Peake, in addition to titanium dioxide pigment and iron ore products.

Mr Wilson said Tivan’s new board would “take advantage of tailwinds” including a shift in Federal Government policy.

“The board is very focused on taking advantage of the tailwinds we’ve got and one of the most important tailwinds is the re-set that’s happening in Canberra - the federal government’s minerals strategy,” he said.

“This commences in some way under the Morrison government but it’s shifted really significantly with new Resources Minister Madeleine King.

“You’ll now see there are various items which have been defined all the way out to 2025 in terms of the National Reconstruction Fund, Value Adding in Resources Fund and various critical minerals’ type development funds.”

TNG former managing director Paul Burton

The company lodged its submission to the Albanese government’s critical minerals strategy this week.

In 20201 the TNG board shelved a controversial plan to develop a processing plant at Middle Arm in favour of building the plant on site at the Mount Peake mine, about 230km north of Alice Springs.

Then TNG managing director Paul Burton said the company had overcome water shortfall issues with development of a water treatment plant.

The NT Environment Protection Authority had twice requested the company provide additional information after it submitted its environmental impact statement in 2019.