PERTH (miningweekly.com) – ASX- and TSX-V listed Euro Manganese will raise C$29-million in a private placement to accelerate work at its Chvaletice manganese project, in the Czech Republic.

The company is offering 50-million chess depositary interests (CDIs) each representing one share at a price of 60c each.

The share offer will be done in two tranches, with the first consisting of more than 41.6-million CDIs to raise an initial C$24.2-million, while the second tranche would consist of more than 8.3-million CDIs, to raise a further C$4.8-million.

The second tranche placement will be subject to shareholder approval.

The share placement is being anchored by a strategic investor and an environmental, social and corporate governance-focused fund, and received strong support from several existing institutional shareholders, Euro Manganese said.

Proceeds from the share placement will be used to advance the Chvaletice manganese project, allowing for the completion of all site and technical work required for a final investment decision by 2022.

“We are very pleased to see such strong and high quality investor interest in this equity offering. We now have the funds required to install, commission and operate our demonstration plant and to finalise our definitive feasibility study and final environmental impact assessment during the next 12 months,” said Euro Manganese president and CEO Marco Romero.

“The demand for high purity manganese products continues to grow and the latest market developments have further improved our prospects. Volkswagen Auto Group recently announced plans to use a high proportion of manganese in their batteries that will be used in the largest segment of its future electric vehicle production.

“In addition, Euro Manganese has secured support from EU-backed EIT InnoEnergy, which is intended to help us accelerate the Chvaletice manange project and to secure strategic financing and customer offtake agreements. Euro Manganese is clearly in the right place at the right time,” said Romero.

A preliminary economic assessment of the Chvaletice project estimated that it would require a capital investment of some $404-million, to produce some 1.19-million tonnes of manganese over a 25-year project life.