Management Team
Mark Connelly - Non-executive Chairman
Mark Connelly is a seasoned financial and commercial executive with extensive resource industry experience in management leadership and board roles. His direct operational and capital markets experience spans many jurisdictions including Australia, North America, South America, Africa and Europe.
Connelly’s North American operating and development experience includes several years based in the U.S. working for Newmont Mining, one of the world’s leading gold mining companies. This included extensive exposure to and knowledge of Newmont’s flagship Nevada gold operations.
Connelly also has an outstanding track record of shareholder value growth and realisation, particularly over the last decade. This includes the development and eventual sale of Papillon Resources for approximately US$570 million and the US$597 million consolidation of Endeavour Mining with Adamus Resources.
Amanda Buckinghamn - Managing Director and CEO
Dr. Amanda Buckingham is a geophysicist who has been involved in mineral exploration for 30 years. She co-founded award-winning and industry-leading geophysical consulting firm Fathom Geophysics in late 2007, based in both Australia and the United States.
Buckingham has extensive exploration experience globally. Her early career involved work as a geoscientist and project manager at majors such as Rio Tinto, listed juniors in both Canada and Australia and several years consulting at SRK.
She also co-founded Cygnus Metals (ASX:CY5) and Desert Minerals (ASX:DM1). She is currently a director of several private companies and a research fellow at the University of Western Australia.
Dianmin Chen - Non-executive Director
Dr. Dianmin Chen is a mining engineer with more than 35 years of experience in metal mining. He has held a wide range of roles in the mining industry including technical, production and management positions in Australia, China and Canada.
Chen held executive roles with Sino Gold (general manager), Citic Pacific Mining (chief operating officer), CaNickel (executive director and CEO) and Norton Goldfields (managing director and CEO) and served as a non-executive director for several publicly listed companies in Australia and Canada, including Kalgoorlie Mining, Bullabulling Gold Mines, Sherwin Iron, Norton Goldfields, NKWE Platinum and CuDeco. He is currently a non-executive director of Global Lithium Resources (ASX:GL1).
Chen holds a Bachelor of Engineering in mining, a PhD in mining geomechanics and a WA First Class Mine Manager’s Certificate of Competency.
Stuart Burvill - GM Corporate/General Counsel
Stuart Burvill is a legal, commercial and compliance manager and civil and structural engineer with over 30 years of experience in mining, petroleum, energy, shipbuilding, defence and civil infrastructure development including rail, roads, bridges and tunnels.
Burvill has extensive experience in M&A, corporate and project finance, capital raising, ownership and funding structuring, joint ventures, construction contracts and disputes, corporate governance and administration and enterprise risk management. He holds a Bachelor of Engineering (Hons), Bachelor of Laws, MBA and Grad Dip in Applied Corporate Governance.
Graeme Morissey - Chief Financial Officer
Graeme Morissey joins Warriedar from previous director-level roles in the audit divisions of global accounting firms EY, KPMG and Grant Thornton. He has over 15 years of direct experience in servicing clients within the mining exploration and development sector. This includes specific expertise extending across compliance with Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) and Department of Mines regulation.
Morissey has also consulted directly with CFOs within the Australian mining sector, which has included optimisation of internal reporting processes on performance, cash flow forecasting, and adherence to budgets. He is a chartered accountant and a fellow of the Governance Institute of Australia.
Morissey holds a Bachelor of Commerce from McMaster University in Canada.
David Palumbo - Company Secretary
David Palumbo from Mining Corporate is a chartered accountant and graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors with over 14 years of experience across company secretarial, corporate advisory and the financial management and reporting of ASX-listed companies. He currently acts as company secretary for a number of ASX-listed companies and serves on the board of Krakatoa Resources (ASX:KTA) and Kaiser Reef (ASX:KAU).
Steve McMillin - Exploration Manager (Nevada)
Steve McMillin is a highly experienced and well-respected exploration geologist. He has over 35 years of practical mineral exploration experience in the United States, with particular expertise in Carlin-style gold projects in Nevada.
Before joining Warriedar Resources, McMillin was at Jerritt Canyon Gold for seven years, including as chief mine geologist. The producing Jerritt Canyon Gold Mine is located only 20 kilometres away from Big Springs along the same mineralisation trend. During his time there, he led underground near-mine exploration and resource development, helping to discover 12 new economic deposits and develop several.
Prior to 2016, McMillin was chief mine geologist at Fire Creek with Klondex, senior exploration geologist with Midway Gold at the Spring Valley and Pan-Goldrock deposits, senior mine geologist at Jerritt Canyon with AngloGold and Queenstake Resources and project geologist with Newmont Exploration in Nevada.
He is a certified professional geologist with American Institute of Professional Geologists, and member of the Geological Society of Nevada and the Society of Economic Geologists.
Thomas Dwight - Exploration Manager (Western Australia)
Thomas Dwight has worked in mineral exploration for several years across Australia and within multiple commodities. He has previously focused on Western Australia gold exploration, including the development of the Tampia Hill Resource with Explaurum Operations, but also has experience in porphyry copper mineralisation managing exploration for Duke Exploration in Queensland.
During his time in the industry, his focus has been exploration, project development and database management. Dwight holds a Bachelor of Science with Honours from the University of Otago, majoring in geology/earth science.
Peng Sha - Chief Geologist
Peng Sha is a geologist with more than 12 years experience in the exploration and evaluation of copper, gold, lead, zinc, silver, rare earth and lithium mining and exploration projects. He has extensive expertise working with several different deposit types across prospective mining jurisdictions, including Australia, Serbia, China and Latin America.
Sha held senior geologist roles in Global Ore Discovery, Ballarat Gold Mine and AuKing Mining. He was also the exploration manager for Zijin Mining Serbia, where he led the exploration team in the development of annual greenfield and brownfield exploration programmes for world-class porphyry, high and low sulphidation epithermal gold and copper deposits and VMS lead-zinc-silver deposits.
Sha holds a Master of Applied Science, Geology and an Honours Degree in Economic Geology (first class) from James Cook University. He is a member of the Society of Economic Geologists and AusIMM.