Toronto-listed OceanaGold on Thursday announced the appointment of Bhuvanesh Malhotra as chief technical and projects officer, effective January 22.
“Following an extensive search, we are pleased to have attracted such a strong and accomplished technical leader to drive value in our projects and studies function during an exciting growth phase for OceanaGold,” commented president and CEO Gerard Bond.
Malhotra has more than 25 years of experience in operational and technical roles across multiple commodities and mining methods, driving safety performance, operational excellence, and sustainable transformational change.
Most recently, he was technical director for copper and Simandou at Rio Tinto, based in Brisbane, Australia, where he was accountable for championing technical and operational excellence to maximise asset performance, including business evaluation of sustaining and growth options across the value chain (openpit, underground mining operations, processing, smelting, refining and asset management) driving long term strategic goals.
This role included management of a global portfolio of assets in North America, Mongolia, South America, Australia and West Africa. Prior to that, he held various operational and technical roles at Rio Tinto, including general manager, technical services and general manager operations for the West Angelas and Robe Valley operations for Rio Tinto Iron Ore.
Malholtra holds a Bachelor of Mining Engineering from Nagpur University, India.