Lotus Resources appoints uranium marketing and sales exec to lock in offtake deals

Lotus Resources (ASX: LOT) has welcomed a new uranium marketing and sales executive to its team as it aims to capture long-term offtake deals for the Kayelekera uranium project in Malawi.

The company today announced the appointment of Dr Robert Rich, who brings more than three decades of experience working as a nuclear fuel consultant. In this role, he advised major US utilities in the procurement of nuclear fuels and worked with a variety of producers in securing offtake agreements.

Lotus managing director Keith Bowes said Dr Rich is “clearly one of the leaders” in the sector globally, having worked extensively with both uranium producers and utility companies for more than 30 years.

“One of the key requirements in securing long-term offtake with major utilities is having established working relationships with these groups.”

“With the uranium market beginning to project a more bullish sentiment, the timing for bringing on a marketing and sales executive is ideal. The Lotus team looks forward to working closely with Robert as we continue to advance the Kayelekera project towards recommencing production,” he added.

Today’s news follows the recent appointments made during the March quarter including Mr Bowes as managing director, Michael Bowen as non-executive chairman and Mark Hanlon as non-executive director, replacing Eduard Smirnov, John Sibley and Stuart McKenzie, respectively.

Nuclear expertise

Dr Rich is based in the United States but has conducted business across North America, Europe, Australia, Asia and the Middle East.

During his career, he has consulted and worked with companies including Paladin Energy (ASX: PDN), Emirates Nuclear Energy Corp, American Uranium Corp and several other North American nuclear utilities, as well as Sumitomo Corp in Tokyo and as the US/Canadian sales and marketing representative for BHP’s (ASX: BHP) Olympic Dam mine in South Australia.

Lotus said Dr Rich has overseen the sale of more than 60 million pounds of uranium from producers during his career and has been responsible for the purchasing of more than US$100 million (A$128 million) annually of uranium oxide, conversion and enrichment in contracts.

He received his PhD and Masters in Geology from Harvard University before becoming a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow for the US Department of Energy (previously ERDA) also at Harvard University.

Director snaps up shares

Meanwhile, an additional $213,304 worth of Lotus stock has been acquired on-market by executive director Grant Davey in four separate share purchases, demonstrating his faith in the company’s uranium strategy.

Mr Davey was appointed to the board in May 2020.

Kayelekera uranium project

Lotus’ 85% owned Kayelekera uranium mine in Malawi has a proven production history after generating 11 million pounds of uranium over five years before closing in 2014 due to low prices.

The company has multiple work programs underway at the project, aiming for a “quick and economical” restart.

The project has an existing high-grade resource of 37.5Mlb of uranium oxide at 630 parts per million.