| Robert M. Friedland Position: Executive Chairman Robert Friedland is in the vanguard of North American natural-resource sector leaders who have pioneered business links in Greater China and the Asia Pacific region during the past 20 years. One of the mining industry's best-known international financiers, Mr. Friedland has been associated with resource development and technology ventures for 25 years. As the founder and Executive Chairman of Ivanhoe Mines — a Canadian public company whose shares trade on the New York, NASDAQ and Toronto exchanges — Mr. Friedland has directed the assembly by Ivanhoe Mines of a portfolio of interests in several countries during the past 14 years. Ivanhoe's core asset is the 12-kilometre-long (7.5-mile) chain of copper-gold deposits discovered at Oyu Tolgoi in southern Mongolia. Oyu Tolgoi, within 80 kilometres of the Mongolia-China border, is the world's largest and highest-grade copper-gold mine development project. Mr. Friedland was named the "2006 Mining Person of the Year" by Canada's Northern Miner, a leading industry publication, for his coup in gaining global mining leader Rio Tinto as a partner for Ivanhoe Mines in Mongolia. The Northern Miner said the partnership was "a defining moment in one of the world's biggest mineral-development success stories of the past decade." It described Mr. Friedland as "a dynamic force for a quarter-century in the minerals industry through a host of private and public-company vehicles." Ivanhoe Mines and Rio Tinto formed a strategic partnership in 2006 to develop the Oyu Tolgoi mining complex. Rio Tinto presently holds a 29.6% interest in Ivanhoe Mines. As Chairman and controlling shareholder of Ivanhoe Nickel & Platinum Ltd. (Ivanplats), Mr. Friedland is closely involved with several mining projects in Africa and Australia, including a copper-cobalt discovery in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the development of a significant nickel-platinum-copper deposit on South Africa's Bushveld Complex. In 1996, he was named Developer of the Year by the Prospectors' and Developers' Association of Canada for his work in establishing and financing companies engaged in mineral exploration and development around the world. Mr. Friedland guided the development and sale of Diamond Fields Resources' nickel discovery at Voisey's Bay in Newfoundland, Canada, to INCO Ltd. for CDN$4.3 billion in 1996 (Inco's Voisey's Bay mine began production in September, 2005). He also led the discovery and sale of Fairbanks Gold's Fort Knox deposit in Alaska to Amax Gold for US$152 million in 1992 (Fort Knox, now owned by Kinross Gold, has produced approximately four million ounces of gold since 1996). Mr. Friedland is Chairman of Ivanhoe Capital Corporation, his family's private company that specializes in venture capital and project financing from bases in Singapore and Beijing. With his leadership, Ivanhoe executives and affiliated benefiting companies have raised several billion dollars on international capital markets since 1993. He also is co-founder of oil and gas producer Ivanhoe Energy and is currently Executive Co-Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. In addition, Mr. Friedland is Chairman of Sunwing Holding Corporation, the parent company of Ivanhoe Energy's operating subsidiary in China and Southeast Asia. Ivanhoe Energy is advancing its breakthrough, proprietary upgrading technology that enables the recovery of heavy-oil reserves around the world and their conversion to lighter, more valuable crude oil at lower costs than older technologies. |
Mongolian
Chinese