Indian State-owned firms mandated to acquire overseas lithium and cobalt assets – by Ajoy J Das (MiningWeekly.com – June 22, 2018)

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KOLKATA (miningweekly.com) – The Indian government has mandated all State-owned mineral-based companies to pool their resources to acquire lithium and cobalt assets overseas.

A rough deadline of March 2019 has been set for these companies to complete all formalities, such as leveraging their balance sheets jointly, form joint ventures (JVs), consortiums or any such suitable corporate structures so that process of scouting and acquiring lithium and cobalt assets could get under way next financial year.

“The mandate for these companies is to acquire and source strategic minerals, lithium and cobalt from abroad,” joint secretary of the Mines Ministry, Anil Kumar Nayak, said.

“Joint ventures of government companies will acquire assets overseas and do the mining operations jointly with entitled agencies in host countries. We will also invite Indian private companies to join in the proposed ventures,” he added.

The model to be followed would be the JV of State-owned National Aluminium Company Limited, Hindustan Copper Limited and Mineral Exploration Corporation Limited, formed last year.

For the rest of this article: http://www.miningweekly.com/article/indian-state-owned-firms-mandated-to-acquire-overseas-lithium-and-cobalt-assets-2018-06-22