Robert Cross has more than 30 years of experience as a founder, financier and advisor in the mining and oil & gas sectors. He was a Co-founder and Non Executive Chairman of B2Gold Corporation from 2007 to 2023, which now produces more than 1,000,000 ounces of gold annually from three mines in Asia and Africa. He is currently a Co-founder and Chairman of Standard Lithium Ltd (since 2018), which is developing two flagship projects in Arkansas.

From 2004 until 2016 he served as Chairman of Bankers Petroleum and oversaw production growth from 600bbl/d to 24,000bbl/d in a large onshore heavy oilfield in Albania. From 2002 until October 2007, he served as Chairman of Northern Orion Resources Inc., a copper developer active in Argentina. For those companies that he served as Chairman in the last 20 years, Mr Cross has been very active in the capital markets, helping to raise equity (over $1Billion) and debt capital, and is well known in London, New York, and Toronto. In addition to raising capital, Mr Cross is a seasoned advisor, not only providing general advice but he also has extensive experience in recruiting top talent, and guiding large projects from the Board level.

Between 1996 and 1999, Mr. Cross was Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Yorkton Securities Inc. From 1987 to 1994, he was a Partner, Investment Banking with Gordon Capital Corporation in Toronto. Mr. Cross has an Engineering Degree from the University of Waterloo and received his MBA from Harvard Business School in 1987.

Jeff Barber was a co-founder and managing partner of a boutique M&A advisory firm in Calgary from 2012 to 2016. Prior, Mr. Barber was an investment banker with Raymond James Limited for four years and held investment banking and equity research positions at Canaccord Genuity Corp before that. Mr. Barber began his career as an Economist with Deloitte LLP. He is a CFA charter holder and holds a Masters in Finance and Economics from the University of Alberta.

Dr. Volker Berl is the founder, managing partner, and CEO of New Age Ventures. Early in his career, Dr. Berl was Head of a Process Development Laboratory at BASF AG, Germany, teaming up to build the Fine Chemical Division’s pharmaceutical contract manufacturing business and overseeing the process development for some of BASF’s most important APIs. More recently, he was Vice President of Equity Research Pharmaceuticals for Deutsche Bank and Chief Technology Officer for the bioscience company Zymes LLC. Dr. Berl holds a MBA from Concordia University, and he completed a postdoctoral chemistry fellowship at Stanford University. Before earning his Ph.D. in Strasbourg, Dr. Berl finished a Masters in Chemical Engineering at the École Nationale Supérieure de Chimie, Polymères et Matériaux, in France.

Mr. Collins has over 35 years of investment banking experience in the industrials, chemicals and energy sectors. He has advised on company strategy, mergers and acquisitions and corporate finance. From 2014 to 2023, he was Senior Advisor and Partner at Centerview Partners, LLC, where he worked with C-suites and boards on long-term strategic issues and financing in the industrials and chemicals sectors. Prior to joining Centerview, Mr. Collins served as the Vice Chairman of Barclay’s North American Investment Banking Division, Energy and Chemicals from 2008 to 2014. Previously, he held various leadership positions at Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, the Blackstone Group and Salomon Brothers. During his tenure in investment banking, he advised on approximately $190 billion in various transactions worldwide. 

Mr. Collins holds a Master of Business Administration from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Civil Law degree with Honors from University College in Dublin, Ireland. 

Claudia D’Orazio, CPA, is an accomplished senior executive with leadership experience across a range of industries, including oil and gas, energy, mining, public audit, and finance. She is currently the Executive Vice President, Chief Human Resources & Technology Officer of Centerra Gold Inc., a publicly traded Canadian-based gold mining company. Prior to joining Centerra Gold, Ms. D’Orazio held several leadership roles with Pembina Pipeline Corporation from 2006 to 2020, ending as Vice President, Human Resources.  She spent the first half of her career in public audit and finance at the Royal Bank of Canada, and KPMG LLP.

Ms. D’Orazio is currently a Board member of the Canadian Mineral Industry Education Foundation. She holds a Chartered Professional Accountant Designation and Bachelor of Commerce in Accounting and Management Information Systems from McGill University.

Ms. Narwold brings over 30 years of experience leading legal, compliance, external affairs, governance, human resources and corporate development functions for multinational companies. Prior to her service at Albemarle, from which she retired in 2023, Ms. Narwold served as Vice President and Strategic Counsel of Barzel Industries, and as Vice President, General Counsel, Human Resources and Corporate Secretary for GrafTech International. Ms. Narwold currently serves on the Board of Directors for Ingevity Corporation, where she is a member of the Audit Committee and the Chair of the Sustainability & Safety Committee.

Ms. Narwold is NACD Directorship Certified® and holds a Bachelor of Arts in political science from the University of Connecticut and a Juris Doctor from the University of Connecticut School of Law.

David Park is a highly experienced executive with a strong energy and industrial sector background, with over 28 years of increasingly responsibilities at various Koch entities, most recently serving as President, Koch Strategic Platforms. Previously, Mr. Park was Senior Vice President, Strategy and Business Development of Georgia-Pacific, LLC, a subsidiary of Koch Industries, where his responsibilities included new platform acquisitions. He served as President of TrueNorth Energy and CFO of Koch’s Canadian exploration and production, pipeline, and energy trading business at Koch Exploration. Early in his career, he was an International Business Development Specialist at Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. Mr. Park holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Texas A&M University and a Master of Arts in Economics from George Mason University.

A geoscientist with over 20 years of experience, Dr. Andy Robinson has worked on a wide range of projects in the resource, power and energy sectors in Europe, Africa, and North and South America. Dr. Robinson hold a Ph.D. in Geochemistry from the University of Bristol, UK.

Anca Rusu is a strategic leader with over 20 years of experience developing and directing global capital projects within the energy sector in Europe, Africa, Asia, and North America. Ms. Rusu held several leadership roles with Shell from 2005 to 2021, including Vice President, Safety and Environment Excellence and Vice President, Projects Shell Chemical Appalachia, where she led the development and construction of Shell’s multi-billion dollar Petrochemicals Complex in Pennsylvania. During the first half of her career, Ms. Rusu held engineering and project management roles with major engineering, procurement, and construction contractors.

Ms. Rusu currently serves on the National Board of the Project Management Association of Canada and as an Advisory Board member for Moss Lake Partners LP, a US-based midstream NGL and logistics developer. She holds a Professional Engineer Designation in Ontario, Canada, an MBA from York University in Toronto, Canada and a Bachelor of Science in Chemical and Mechanical Engineering from Politechnica University of Bucharest, Romania.