Savannah Resources (LSE:SAV) — Investor Presentation

0:00 Good afternoon, and welcome to the SAVANNAH RESOURCES PLC Investor Presentation. Throughout this recorded presentation, investors will be in listen only mode. Questions are encouraged and could be submitted at any time via the Q and A tab situated on the right hand corner of your screen. Simply type in your questions and press send. The company may not be in a position to answer every question it receives during the meeting itself. However, the company can review all questions submitted today and publish responses where it's appropriate to do so. Before we begin, I'd like to submit the following poll, and I'd now like to hand you over to Emmanuel Perencia, CEO. Good afternoon,

0:31 sir. Thank you, Lily, and thanks everyone who's joining us. For many of you, it will it will be a a sequence of some of the other meetings that we're doing in the same format every four months. For a few of you, it will be the first time. In the first slides, we will recap a bit of, you know, for story and of what we're doing for for your benefits. Let me also tell you that today, have the benefits of having Rick Hansen together with us. Rick is the the chairman of SAVANNAH RESOURCES and a good good support in his first months that we have him on board. So over the presentation, I will also pass it on to Rick so they can can also share a bit more of his background of how kind of how he sees this project. So looking forwards to what I hope is an interesting session for all of those who are following us.

1:26 I will I will skip the disclaimers that you already know. So I will not spend a lot of time here, but I will go into how we have closed this year both in terms of register and share performance. So we as a company have continued to grow our share of Portuguese representatives in the in the register. We are now at around 20% of the company in Portuguese. Hence, this is, coming from, 0.5 or less than 0.5% of of the company in Portuguese. Hence, only, in the summer of twenty three. So it is a very interesting progress and a very good endorsement of not only the quality of the project, but also the the the way the project is starting to be seen by most in Portugal. So it's something that we welcome and that we're happy with. You will you know that SAVANNAH has main purpose to, now is to focus on developing the GOVOSO lithium projects in Northern Portugal. This is Europe's largest volume in, lithium deposits, and so potential cornerstone elements for the battery value chain in Europe.

2:39 It is also a very good project for many global standard cities. Not, by far, not the not the best lithium projects that is operating right now, but it clearly is one of the very good ones. And it could be operating at current price levels, and we will delve a bit into that specifically. The other thing that is interesting and important to say is that we have finished 24 with share price rising more than a 100%. This was a significant recovery from where we were, but it still is just part of the recovery. So significant upsize remains, and we will talk a bit about that also, which is, I would say, quite interesting for our shareholders. The last point to refer in these slides to say that we are well funded today so we can go through, all the steps that we, are required to deliver over this year comfortably, and we can progress at a very good speed so as to deliver this project and start operating it in '27 as soon as possible.

3:48 Recalling you of what the project is about. So the concession area, you see it in both pictures in red in this in this slide. What you see to the left is the total footprint of the project over the seventeen years, that it is meant to to exist for in this, in this first phase. So not all of these will be operating at the same time. So at start, we will only be operating in the area that you see it in the on the on the left picture. The area that you see in green, that's the plants, some of the support infrastructure that you see to the right of it, and in the pits that you see in gray below the plants, that's the Pinheiro pits. That's the start of our projects together with the roads that you see to the right, the North Access Road, which is an 11 kilometer road until the the regional road that connects directly to the to the highway. So that's that's where we're gonna be working in the first year.

4:49 The projects, we will be working on everything else that you see in the picture. And as we go, when we will be working in NOAA and Reservatorium to the left, we will already have backfilled Pinguero and reforested Pinguero, and we will be in the process of backfilling and reforesting the other pits that you see to the north. We will talk also a few more seconds about what we have as additional potential. But to the right, you see that we continue to have a 28,000,000 ton resource classified under the JORC code, which is already a very sizable and interesting resource at a good grades of lithium. We have referred in the past this additional exploration target of 11 to 19,000,000 tons. What we released this week shows that there could be potential for this number to be understates.

5:46 These additional ore bodies that you see in gray or in or in black are all potential war bodies that are not included in the resource that we have today and are not included in the projects as we have it today. So it's a potential upside which will be very interesting to delve into as we go and progress in the project and as we do the right thing and deserve to to develop those also. The other recollection of information is on in this slide to reinforce that from a technical perspective, this is a quite conventional project. It is we we're working on with a very clean concentrate products. We have the the luck of having low iron and micro contents in the the resource itself.

6:44 And the advantage of working in a region which is not at the middle of Australia 2,000 kilometers away from the ports or not in other regions of the world where you have a bit of more political uncertainty and infrastructures that are not as good. We have good the support of good infrastructure, and we also have, the advantage of having interesting, downstream industries such as ceramics, glass, and, and insulation, which will benefit from our self spark words and mica mixes that come out of the plants itself as byproducts. And all of this means that we will we expect to be operating close to the middle of the global cost curve in a very good competitive position and that we would, given the scoping study numbers, be operating at a breakeven price. And this breakeven price includes capital costs, So it is breakeven of NPV of at $600 per ton. So we would, in current price conditions, be working, comfortably, and that's, important. So we obviously will prefer, when, the the prices recover to what is a global incentive price for development of the industry, but, we will be working at this crisis.

8:09 The other important thing to, recall is where we are in terms of macro trends, and, these macro trends aren't only being reinforced as we speak. I told you four months ago to those who were in the video conference that we were expecting to finish the year with a strong growth in EV penetration despite all of the noise around around this EV growth over the year of '24. It was a year in which probably no media outlets had less than a couple of PCs saying the TV penetration was not growing as fast as they expected. Well, with all of those bad news, we still got to 25% growth globally, which is quite impressive. The same, goes or even more interesting goes to, BSS, the big battery storage systems.

9:01 They were just almost look like, research, kind of projects only twelve months ago. They are now starting to be delivered at the hundreds of megawatts sizes in a variety of locations globally, and we expect this to be also a significant additional push to the demands of lithium. At the same price, in the current price conditions, at the same time with the current price conditions, what we are saying is that the projects that do not have as competitive a position as as hopefully ours are either being delayed or not resting as fast or are slightly reducing production from what they expected to have. Some companies are even posting negative results now for the year end, which is not a surprise given where prices were in '24.

9:53 And what we see is that this may help further define supply demand gap in '27 and beyond, which we would, be, helping to, sort out and benefiting from. And so it is important to be in, that position. The additional point is that regardless of where we are exactly over the coming two or three years in terms of, in terms of global markets, the macro trends remains, very strong. The IEA is now forecasting a 9x increase in lithium events until 2040. We see these better and more affordable EVs as a trend that will not stop. This exploding BSS demand is something that will change a bit of the demand supply projections for the coming years. So, medium to long term, the outlook

10:47 looks quite interesting for us, and we're in a good position to navigate through the, tough times, that the industry is still on going through. As a recollection also, this is what we're doing in '25, '26, and '27. So this year is the year in which we complete the FS and, start to put all pieces together that are required to start, to prepare, for building. That's that will include preparing, the project finance. So the more we are able to, to progress on project financing over the this year, the more we will be able to shorten the time between DFS and start of construction. And, in any scenario, with the current timeline, we expect to be to be building in '26 and to be producing in '27, as, refers, before. So it's exciting times ahead, lots of work, but also lots of interesting things to deliver, and we will keep you posted as we deliver that.

11:54 Looking at only these last four months, and I think that's the fact that this was only over the last four months, speaks for the speed at which we are now progressing. And this is, I think, exciting and good, for all those who are stakeholders, in various stakeholders in this project. We, we got confirmation of eligibility for a $2,270,000,000 loan guarantee from the German, state governments and its support institutions, and the KFW. So this was a good endorsement of the quality of the project and of its importance for the battery value chain and for the

12:37 automotive markets in Europe as a whole. We already covered the fact that we ended '24 with a good recovery on the share price and a good percentage of Portuguese shareholding in the company. The second mining lease is now clarified, so we will, over this year, be in position to get hold of the Aldea the Aldea blocks. We have expanded the team, and this is significant because

13:06 most of that expansion, almost all of that expansion has been done in boutique, and we are now more concentrated in the region. So we are reducing a bit of the complexities of having part of the team here and there in the globe and concentrating more of our efforts and more of our capabilities in in Northern Portugal. And so I think we in the last twelve months, I think we tripled, the, team, locally. It still is in the in the dozens, so it's not, where we will be in two or three years' time, but it already is an important sign of involvements of the local community, the families of so many people that are or villagers and at the same time part of the SAVANNAH RESOURCES Some so some people that are moving and trans transferring their lives from the coastal regions of Portugal into Trasos Montes, and this is important for a region that is impoverished today and that needs a new a new generation of youth to come in. So it

14:12 was good progress in that front also. The other point that I'd like to, highlight is that we, got this temporary land usement that was awarded. This means that we are now working as we speak, in, in area that is still not ours, object obviously, in, conditions that are predetermined, in the law and paying, value associated to it to the to the appropriate owners, today. But this is further reinforcement that we are progressing in the right direction. We are now working in all aspects of the access plan that we've had designed for for for a while now. And this includes purchases, which we're continuing to do. We're continuing to buy land plots locally, and a few rental negotiations that are interesting that are ongoing.

15:03 And these easements and the compulsory purchase process that we have started. We started talking about it locally for now six months, and now we have started the initial steps of it. For those who don't fully understand this process, it is important to highlight that this is a process that is well defined, in, Portuguese law. Actually, in most most countries have, if not all countries have, sort of proposed report purchase process, and this is frequently used by infrastructure projects, only in the region, only a few kilometers away. A few years ago, Iberdrola has done a set of dams, and these dams, were, subject to compulsory purchase programs. A highway locally was built on the basis of compulsory purchases.

15:53 And it is normal that this happens also because property in the region is not always easy to define. There are border definition issues. There are inheritance issues of with some plots. Some of the plots that we need to acquire are as small as eight square meters, forest area. So you imagine that all of these, require an expropriation procedure to, to be sorted out. So the good thing is that we have started this, and it is not part of our critical path so we can progress, at, at appropriate speed so as to have control of the lab when it is, required. And the other good thing is that I will show you a bit of the geo the the the refurbishing and additional infrastructure that we've been doing. This is also an important step in the direction of showing that we are part of local and that we're doing the right thing for for this region that will benefit so much from from this project.

16:56 Only in four months, so I hope we will have very good news to share again, in, in four months' time. A bit more of detail of this on these additional ore bodies, for which we've announced, results, this year. So this was it is important to highlight this that this was, rock ship, results. So a very basic exploration worker with no intervention in, or no significant intervention in the field, but it allows the geology team to further confirm that there are additional ore bodies in the concession area. And, some of the results have gone, are, in very good numbers for any industry standard. We go up to two and not, and even to 3% of lithium content in some samples. So exciting to see these confirmed. The geology team was already quite confident that this would be the case. But, anyway, at a low cost, we are confirming that there is additional potential, and this is important also because what this means is that, these projects can have significantly longer lifetime, after after this first phase if we're doing everything right, which is good for everyone that will benefit and live out of the jobs that we will create. They will continue to have jobs for decades, to come, which is, also good, for everyone, I would say.

18:26 On this local infrastructure, I'm just showing you this to tell you that companies that have similar projects to ours face a kind of a small dilemma when we are at this stage. We have already invested years and years of work, in our case, eight years in the area. We have invested already 10,000,000 tens of millions of, euros into doing what we are doing to prepare, this project, and the region does not see it yet, does not see those investments yet apart from a few restaurants, and a few, hotel, a few hotel nights, which are not irrelevant for the context of the region. But it's it sometimes looks, like it is not as much as I'd like to see. So what we have done in these last four months and are continuing to do over the coming six is we have started to rehabilitate and revamp some of the areas in which we either work or live. And this is important because it involves local teams. It involves

19:27 local suppliers. It involves local people working together with us and seeing their heritage, seeing their areas, seeing the places that are neighbor to their own houses being rehabilitated and starting to welcome more new people to to the community. So that's not very significant investments for now. We are starting to be able to show a face which we can be proud of locally and to be seen locally as part of the positive developments of the region. Still at a modest scale, but with concrete results to show, which is, very important. Would like to just share with you a few pictures that that have been taken in the last forty eight hours. So, obviously, work is continuing at a good speed. So some of these pictures show what what the the the geoteam is doing on the ground.

20:22 So we are drilling, right now with four rigs. The the samples are coming out. And as you see, you see significant extensions of spodumene rich samples, which is exactly what we were expecting. We're already, cutting the samples, shipping them to the international laboratories that validates the quality of the results, and we have tens of people, in the fields doing, their jobs with the right, quality, with the right safety, safeguards, and progressing, well. So this is, good and important progress. And at the same time, we have our team is just, part of every, every day, the the the the the days, the of the usual life, in, the community. So you see here our team members being taking part in, the local fairs, being invited by rep local representatives to, be part of the organization of other, small, local events.

21:26 You see myself with Martha, inaugurating one of the houses that we have rehabilitated in after after having having stayed there for for for a few nights. You see Rui as a representative of the new staff that has just come in. Only these months, we've welcomed seven new staff to the local team. So it is good progress that we're seeing in variety of of of fronts. And this is just because a question came in and it comes to to this point, further endorsements of the quality of work that we're doing locally and the humble but positive way at the same time in which we are getting involved in all aspects of local life.

22:16 As a result, yes. The question was whether, people locally, were buying, shares. I know that I personally know that a few have bought, which is good. Every time that happens, even if it's only for a couple of thousands of euros, it is a very good endorsement of, of the the projects and of our work. So I I'm always very happy to hear when that happens. And this includes people we engage with, daily. It includes people we we just know and see, here and there. The truth is that today, I would say that we already know, most, if not all, people in the villages around the concession area. And around here means between one kilometer and 15 kilometers away.

23:03 So it is, as most of you know, not a very densely populated area. And we obviously are a a big part of their lives already, and they are already already a big part of of our lives also and of the life of the project including through modest shareholding, which is great. Just a few highlights before I pass this on to Rick. So at this stage, we know that we are progressing at good speeds in a project that is critical in many aspects for the region, for the country, for Europe, for the battery value chain, and for the energy transition as a whole. So we are excited to be part of this. We know that this is an achievable project, which is good. It's conventional mining. It's very competitive.

23:52 It has a modest CapEx. The mineral mineral mineralogy, sorry, is easy to process through very well known and established process. We have the best engineering that the sector has globally working together with us. It is an expandable project as we have seen. We continue to see, goods reasons to, further confirm that there are, multiple additional targets for resource growth. It is a valuable project, and the value was recognized at AMG. It was recognized or is being recognized by Portuguese investors, and it is continuing to be recognized as we progress in derisking it. And we continue to see significant value to be untapped. Srik will explain a bit more. And it's investable. It's a great project.

24:40 The management team is very good. We now includes have included as part of the newcomers into the project, people who are coming from from mineral resources. They were involved in projects that are operating and running today in the global lithium scene and that are some of the best projects in the sector. So we are confident that we have the skills that are required to do these projects, very well. Passing it on to, Rick. Rick, I'd love to, invite you to share a bit of, your history, in, in the sector, and I'd like also to ask you to please share with with those who are listening to us why you believe in SAVANNAH's projects. If I can just intro Rick to all those that are following this. Rick has is now the chairman of SAVANNAH since summer last year. He comes from almost two decades of lithium industry. He started with Orocobre when it was listed. So we will tell you a bit a bit more about the story of, getting or being part of the team that's, got from Orocobre to, the Rio Tinto arm, for lithium, today.

26:04 Rick, your stage, please. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks, Emmanuel. I mean, our I I was involved with our from when it was a, $6,000,000, IPO in 2007 right until right through to the end of the merger with Arcadian at about eighteen months ago when that was done at a that was done at a 10,000,000,000 plus US 10,000,000,000 plus, valuation. And as as we're all aware, Arcadian's now been taken out well, it's in the process of being taken out by Real on that transaction. We'll complete. So that's been a a great journey. It was also so the lessons some key lessons that came out of our and and all came in terms of in terms of partners, in terms of development, in terms of in terms of focus, and in terms of, yeah, frankly frankly, working hard to ride the cycles in in in what is still I don't think anyone has a has a complete crystal ball about where the lithium industry is going to add up, but you you need to be nimble. You need to have good partners. You need to be financed.

27:18 And what what got me excited or interested in in joining SAVANNAH is really, really captured on that slide. This is this is a project which ticks all those boxes. It's a development phase project, and there's not a lot and and I wouldn't I wouldn't say it was unique. But currently, from a timing perspective, it is it is very well timed because if we can hit our hit our targets, there's no reason why we can't. If we could hit our targets and we're bringing production into the market in 2027, there is very, very little production that is likely to be coming on between now and twenty twenty twenty seven. We perhaps have the Linetown ramping up, but there's no other major spodumene coming out of coming out of Australia. There might be some Brazilian supply, and then there's a question mark about about brines and DLEs.

28:15 So if if and and the other key part about this project is that is that it makes money now. It makes money at us it makes money at a spot price in the $8.08 fifties, and it makes quite quite a decent return. So it is a valuable it is a valuable and investable project. And if if we do see is there is there is a little bit of a consensus about tightening tightening supply around that 27 mark spodumene lifting, you know, 1,200 to $1,500, this is a very valuable project. And and I think as Emmanuel said, when we talk about expandable, the work that's being done down there at the moment in terms of the resource, we know that there's we know that there's there's a lot of targets down there, and we have a high level of confidence that we're gonna be able to grow that resource.

29:07 That flows into a higher mine life. It potentially flows into an optimized optimized mine life in terms of grade and and pit expansions. And and it also provides for, yeah, for the ability to to expand that project. And as I said, it's pretty simple technology that that's being used. It's tried and tried and tested over the last ten years. And so we should be able to expand the project, in line with what we'd expect to be an expanded, an expanded resource. Value creation in the lithium sector, I'll just touch on that on that briefly. This is this is what happened in the the period between 2020 and '22, and SAVANNAH missed out on all of that ups uptick for for various reasons, lack of lack of approvals, unexpected unexpected problems on on-site financing problems. So it's the that blue line ticking along the bottom, whereas you could see you could see the some of the other well known players simply simply tracking the tracking or exceeding the Chinese spodumene concentrate price.

30:20 So I think I think it's an interesting slide, but what it does what it does tell you is we've believed that we've got SAVANNAH into a position now where where yeah. Given that there is a market recovery, we don't we don't expect a rapid rapid bounce. It's more it's more a little bit little bit more like climbing climbing slowly out of a fairly deep hole at the at the moment. But we're that that there is there is there is movement, but we would expect we would expect our valuation and our share price to be to be reflecting the improved market conditions. And, also, obviously, we're we're working towards having a DFS out by the end of the year, which which will which will be something that we can point to in terms of where the value where the value lies in this project.

31:10 Emmanuel, might just hand back to you on this on this slide. Sure. Sure. Thank you, Rick. I will for sure share some of the responses to the questions that will come afterwards. Everyone knows that you are you're free to to to ask all the questions you may you may have, and we'll come to to them in in just a few minutes. So you have seen this slide. Those who follow the story, you've seen the slides previously. You haven't seen it with the updated numbers. So now that we have recovered some of the valuation in '24, it is important to readjust these numbers to the current valuations. And what we see, we are the the the green column, more or to the link to the middle and left of of the chart, is that versus our global peers, the the few global peers that are in position to deliver, projects over the coming, three to, seven years, we are, still significantly undervalued.

32:11 So we still see significant potential to just re rerate versus some of the post EA scoping study and PFS peers. And as we progress from scoping study to production, what is expected is that we deliver the value associated to that derisk and to that execution, and we get to valuations that are consistent with the on a pro rata basis, of course, on a pro rata basis to the size and to the quality of the resource of the big names in the sector that you know, the overall models, the mean resources, the Pilbara's, and the the SQMs. The other thing that we know is that as we go, we will grow grow the the value potential of of the project. We know that's the area is a good one as already referred, and that should trigger trigger these additional value drivers that we have referred, both internal trigger triggers associated to developing and building further value from us to to our market and in terms of the recovery in lithium prices and and spodumene price conditions.

33:18 So, we firmly believe that, doing our job right over the coming years will step by step generate further value further significant value for our shareholders, and then we're obviously focused in, making sure that that happens. As, in parallel, the good thing is that when you have a good project and you deliver it with with consciousness of how good you can do to so many fronts, you can deliver a project that is good for all the stakeholders. So we want these projects to be good for our team. We want these projects to be good for the local community and for the region, and we want these projects to be good for our all of our stakeholders, be them suppliers, clients, partners, value chain companions, both in Portugal and in Europe and our shareholders, of course. So, excited to be part of this project. Also excited to have, had so many developments in only these last, four months and to be progressing well in a variety of fronts. This is a project that, you know, will will continue to to be questioned and and continue to be scrutinized by many. That is normal, and we know that that just adds to our responsibility of doing things correctly.

34:42 But I think that's what we are doing and what is being seen is confirming that, and we will continue to act that way so as to deliver value and opportunity for, all, stakeholders as referred. Very well. Can we perhaps, get to the questions maybe? Emmanuel, Rick, thank you very much for your presentation. Ladies and gentlemen, please do continue to submit your questions just by using the q and a tab situated on the top right hand corner of your screen. Just while the company take a few moments to review those questions submitted today, I'd like to remind you that recording of this presentation, along with a copy of the slides and the published q and a, can be accessed via investor dashboard. As you can see, we received a number of questions throughout today's presentation. And can I please ask you to read out the questions and give responses where appropriate to do so? And I'll pick up from you at the end.

35:33 Thank you very much. The questions are coming in. Let me just try to to cover them. So we've covered the one associated to people from the local community buying shares. So that one is is covered. We also have another one, which is more of a clarification, I would say, asking for more detail on what what we are making money on. And now I think it's we would be making money at current price levels. Correct? This is related to one of your comments, Rick. Yeah. I think I'd I'd I'd understand that to be a question about, I guess, comparing what what our last published round of all in sustaining cost was against current against current spot. The answer is there is a there is a there is a margin there. We are profitable even at the in the in the eighth 850, and that that gives us that gives us a and, obviously, those those numbers that came out, back in the previous were were from a PFS, and that's the point. Obviously, the point of doing the DFS is to, is to firm those numbers. But indicatively indicatively, the projects the the the the project is in the right part of the cost curve, for a spodumene for a spodumene project, it it it will not it will not be a marginal producer. It's it won't be a swing producer like some of the more expensive like some of the more expensive operations are in

37:03 Western Australia. It has strong project economics. And then maybe I maybe I could take the the next question from I think it's a question from Rob about takeovers. I mean, that's it's a legitimate question when we when we we have what we believe to be an under an undervalued asset. The only a couple of points to note is that that whilst there has been plenty of activity in in on the M and A side in in lithium at at at a it has it has generally been at a at at the higher end such as the the Rio or some of the mergers that that the Chinese have done particularly within, with Argentinian assets. There's also there's also never been, any, a hostile, takeover of, any company in the lithium sector or even one there may have been some attempted, but there's there's never been any that's come out come out publicly. So that's not to say that we don't take take it seriously. We, we, as a board, our job is to make sure that we deliver on the targets that we've got. That is the best defense, is to have a clear strategy, to make sure we're appropriately funded, and to work closely with our with our shareholders, both both big and small so that they're comfortable that we are that that we are best positioned to deliver the value that we have in this project rather than trying to hand it off to somebody else to try and do that.

38:31 Right. This was reentering to a question on whether we would be worried about takeover as at the current at the current prices. I would add to to your point, Rick, that if anything, today, are more prepared for a for a for such a scenario than we were only twelve months ago just by the simple fact that we have slightly rerated and also by the fact that we have a shareholder structure that is now more long term oriented and that includes a strategic partner and long term oriented players such as AMG and includes Portuguese backers that are supporting the projects to be developed fully. So that's our focus. Yes. They're they're they're they're they're they're just seeing the value unlocked. They're not there as a financial trade.

39:17 Exactly. Another question came in on, the German government loan guarantee, and the question is whether other government funding sources are potentially available. The answer to that is, that we we expect that that that some of them will be at some point eventually. I might actually have a meeting even today with with an entity, one of these national entities of a European country. We are continuing to progress in talks with other with other government institutions and with other state owned bankers, financial bankers, and we've talked about the European investment banks, the big funds, and the likes. So the this would be expectable also because it is what we are seeing globally. The Chinese players have done that extensively to develop their value chain. The American the American government is supporting extensively projects in in the industry, and what we are seeing is that both the German states, the French states, the Italian states, Spanish states, and also the Portuguese states are developing their own mechanisms to support the development of an industry that is important for the decades, if not century to come. So everyone is conscious of that, and we certainly are also conscious that we need to do the right things for us to to deserve those additional supports.

40:45 We're very happy that we have the first public endorsement by the German states. We will continue to work on others. Another question on when when we would expect to announce more partnerships like the one we have with AMG. I would say that the first answer to this is we have space for other partnerships, and that's the good news. Right? So we are a 100% owners of the project, and we have most of the offtake still still available. And we know that our projects can help accelerate the development of other projects further downstream in in the region. So the when is when it will best suit our project and our shareholders. So be patient because we know that we will deliver on that when the right time and the right deals are on the table.

41:42 The other question is on asking asking a a bit bit more about the two significant Portuguese shareholders who have joined the register this year. I would say the first thing is that and one one thing that makes me happy as I referred is that they are part of hundreds of Portuguese investors that we already have in the register. So I am as excited to have these more solid high net worth backers as so many small retail investors who are seeing potential value in the project and believe in what we are doing. But with with the two Portuguese the two main Portuguese shareholders that have come in, what we're seeing is confidence in the ability to develop a project that is important for Portugal, confidence that the team is able to deliver to deliver it, and confidence that we can build something good for, the country, overall. So, I see a set of, of elements that allow me to reinforce what Richard referred, which is that they are long term oriented. They're oriented so it's benefiting from the development of the project to support us locally in making sure that that happens.

43:02 Another question on whether we're marketing the company to institutional investors. And if there are institutional investors in Portugal which could invest. I can tell you that there is already at least one additional institutional investor that has started to buy shares in the company. We know because they have told us so. They're still not at the the thresholds that would that would make them needs to need to be public, but it is one of these very well established institutional shareholders in the country. So, yes, there are a few of them, and, certainly, they are looking at the story as we progress. And in due time, I expect and hope that they will see the right opportunity to to come in. Only this week, Rick and I, together with Aiza, are supporting us.

43:54 We're in London doing part of this this work of talking to a few institutional shareholders, specialists in energy transition, specialists in critical and battery materials, who are attentive and looking at our progress and, obviously, looking at understanding if and when it would be a good time to to join. We're patient. And as Rick referred, we are focused on delivering the projects. The more we deliver it, the more we progress, the more it will make sense for the company to be valuable and for all of these investors to come in. A curious company curious question, does the company use electric vehicles? The answer is yes. I am the shameful I would say probably the only shameful member of the team that still has a plug in hybrid.

44:45 All of the other, elements of the team that have, a car company, for worker for their own, for their own use are, using electric vehicles, and this includes people who do 500 kilometers a week and and more. So, yes, we want to talk and we deliver on what we are doing. Obviously, the equipments in the fields, some of them are still are not electric yet. But as we go and as we progress and as the industry progresses and has good, options for that also, we are attentive, and we are working on, using them as as we see fit. I think we may have told you that we are working specifically with one of the global leaders in the in electrical equipments for mining operations right now. So we're part of their potential early adopter pool, and they're very interested in having us together. So we we are attentive to these opportunities.

46:00 Another question. Do we have a resource targets for the DFS? It it will be part of what we will be talking about over over the years. So when we are closer to delivering, the DFS at each step of, development, we will keep you posted. So we'll tell you about, about all of these. But I can tell you that the the the the drilling works that we're doing right now is mostly focused on two things. First, upgrade upgrading those 28,000,000 tons to the measured and inferred categories. That's one that is obviously important. And the second one already, geotechnical work, meaning work that allows us to make sure that the DFS will include engineering detailed engineering that is implementable with no surprises when it will be built.

46:55 Another question from someone who has followed the last presentation. Thank you for that. I think that I smiled broadly when I was asked whether the project was strategic and whether the European Commission also regarded it as strategic. Is this still the case, and are you expecting news? We I think I referred in the last meeting, we are one of the companies that has submitted an application to be classified as a strategic project. There are many such companies through through Europe. Caliber, for example, is, I think, one of them. Some refining projects, the same. Some battery projects, battery assembly projects, the same.

47:42 This process is ongoing. We expect to have news by mid to late March. That's what the European Commission announced. So, yes, I still expect the projects to be seen as strategic. I certainly see it as as such, and I certainly have signs of all of those stakeholders involved that they understand that it is. Another question came in from Stephen Stefan. Sorry. If any show shareholder wanted to come and see the project in action, would SAVANNAH welcome them and show them around where possible? The answer is certainly yes, just subject to logistical conditions and ability to deliver a good a good site visit.

48:32 So feel free to to ask for that specifically to to our contacts directly through through ways or through the regular company contact. I think I even have a slide here that's that's that has this email info at SAVANNAH RESOURCES dot com. We're just responding to the invites for the for this or to the contacts that are in our website and in our in our analysis. We will try to put together a few invitees when when they come to site just because it is already a lot of people who wants to come and visit. So just logistics, but you'd be most welcome to come. And I think you would like to come. Portugal is an amazing country, and the region is a very interesting one. One. So I think we can be good hosts in a good region.

49:23 And from Anna, if the project is seen as strategic, what are the main benefits for SAVANNAH? Well, it's it's for SAVANNAH for the project and for the value chain. And the fact that we are doing the right thing and that we are becoming, as we go, more credible and more important in the development of the whole European value chain, the more it is good for us and for those who are part of these projects. Strategic projects, classifications usually tend to, help the project be better understood at the Europeans at European level. They also usually help, the projects to, be granted funds, more easily. So it is a kind of, first confirmation, of addition or additional confirmation of the quality of the project, which makes it more bankable, more supportable, and more attractive for everyone.

50:21 That's what I would say. Emmanuel, Rick, thank you for answering all those questions you can, investors. And, of course, the company can review all questions submitted today, and we'll publish those responses on the investor meet company platform. Just before redirecting investors to provide with their feedback, which I know is particularly important to the company, Emmanuel, could I please just ask you for a few closing comments? I'm just very happy to, keep, this routine of, talking to you, more or less every four months. I was also happy to, do this with, Rick this time. It's great to have people, like Rick who who are so experienced in the lithium sector, as part of this SAVANNAH journey. We're excited, to be working well towards the benefit of all who are directly or indirectly parts of the project, and we're committed to continuing, our work in the right direction.

51:16 Thank you all. Emmanuel Rick, thank you for updating investors today. Can I please ask investors not to close this session as you'll now be automatically redirected to provide your feedback in order that the management team can better understand your views and expectations? This will only take a few moments to complete, and I'm sure will be greatly valued by the company. On behalf of the management team of SAVANNAH RESOURCES PLC, we'd like to thank you for attending today's presentation, and good afternoon to you all.