Board of Directors

Facilitating a greener energy future

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Paul Atherley
Chairman

Mr Atherley is a highly experienced senior resources executive with wide ranging international and capital markets experience and based in London. He graduated as mining engineer from Imperial College London and has held a number of senior executive and board positions.

He is based in London and has broad experience in raising debt and equity finance for resource companies.

He served as Executive Director of the investment banking arm of HSBC Australia. He is currently Chairman of LSE listed Pensana Plc which is establishing the world’s first independent and sustainable rare earth processing hub at the Saltend Chemicals Park in the Humber Freeport UK and Non Executive Chairman of LSE listed Alkemy Capital Investments Plc which is establishing the Tees Valley Lithium refinery in the Teesside Freeport, UK.

Mr Atherley is a strong supporter of Women in STEM and has established a scholarship which provides funding for young women to further their education in science and engineering.

Tim George
Executive Director / Chief Executive Officer

Tim holds an honours degree in Minerals Engineering from Leeds University and leverages over 35 years of broad experience across the mining, engineering construction and infrastructure sectors, largely in Africa.

He initially spent a decade in production management at various Anglo-American Group operations followed by involvement in engineering design and feasibility studies in multiple base and precious metal projects. Previous directorships include several resource sector entities listed on AIM, OSE, STO and ASX where he fulfilled executive roles in multi-jurisdictional corporate management, capital raising and M&A activity.

Tim has served as CEO of LSE listed Pensana Plc since 2019, which is establishing an independent and sustainable rare earth processing hub at the Saltend Chemicals Park in the Humber Freeport UK alongside development of low-carbon footprint mining and beneficiation operations at Longonjo in Angola.

Rob Kaplan
Executive Director / Finance Director

Robert is a Chartered Accountant with over 20 years operating experience in the African mining sector. His addition to the Pensana team brings a broad skill set in both the UK and sub‐Saharan corporate finance together with experience in mining operations in Angola, South Africa and Tanzania.

Robert has joined Pensana from London listed Petra Diamonds Limited where in his role as Finance Manager Corporate and Head of Treasury he was involved in a number of mine financings including two US$ bond issues totalling US$1 billion, a number of African lender facilities totalling over US$750 million and most recently an equity rights issue of US$178 million on the London Stock Exchange.

Dr Jeremy Beeton
Non-Executive Director

Dr. Beeton has extensive international experience in project management over complex multi-site, multiple project operations’ portfolios for national and regional government, as well as public and private companies.

Dr. Beeton was Director General of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games from 2007 until 2012, and Chairman of WYG PLC and Merseylink Limited. He was also a Principal Vice President with Bechtel, an Advisory Board member of PricewaterhouseCoopers until October 2018, and an independent NonExecutive Director of SSE plc until July 2018.

Rt Hon Baroness Northover
Non-Executive Director

Baroness Northover was the Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to Angola (2016- 2020), Zambia (2017-2020) and a Minister in the Department for International Development (“DFID”) 2011-15, including serving as Parliamentary Under Secretary and Africa Minister, 2014-15.

She has been at the core of the recent successful development of the UK/Angola bilateral relationship which has seen significant progress in recent years. She is a member of the House of Lords; Honorary Associate Professor at the Institute of Global Health Innovation, Imperial College, London; a Member of the Advisory Council, Wilton Park; and a former Trustee of the Malaria Consortium and UNICEF UK.

Steve Sharpe
Non-Executive Director

Mr Sharpe is a highly experienced natural resources financier. He is an Executive Board Member of EIT RawMaterials. Previously, he was Chair of AME Group, Managing Director at Canaccord Genuity, Managing Director at Endeavour Financial and held senior positions at Standard Bank and NM Rothschild.

Alison Saxby

Independent Non-Executive Director

Alison is an industry leading expert with over 35 years of experience in industrial minerals and metals. Her expertise includes pricing, deep market knowledge, research, and communications, gained through consultancy projects, minerals trading and commercial reports.

She was previously a Managing Director at metals consultancy Roskill, where she led the strategic direction of the company’s research and products through a period of growth, with a focus on critical materials. Prior to that she held roles at Fastmarkets and as an independent consultant.

Alison was recently a member of the UK government’s Critical Materials Global Expert Mission to both Canada and the USA for Innovate UK-KTN, and is working with Edumine to provide educational courses on critical materials. She is the author of numerous publications on critical and other minerals and originally trained as a mineral engineer.

Board of Directors