The rollercoaster career of Neal Froneman

[miningmx.com] – THE career OF Neal Froneman, who will lead the newly created SA gold company Sibanye Gold, captures the swashbuckling efforts of mining entrepreneurs of days past.

Sibanye Gold will have 1.4 million ounces of gold production annually and consist of mature mines unbundled from Gold Fields. In essence, the company, though new-sounding, owns some of SA’s oldest operating mines, and its grandest.

Even the strategy of using Sibanye Gold as a beachhead for consolidation – or “ripping down the farm boundaries’ as Gold Fields CEO, Nick Holland, described it – is a reprise of earlier plans that are based on the fundamental fact that the country’s gold sector is in sunset mode.

Froneman admits to giving up meaty retention bonuses at Gold One International, the company he created. But the allure of a broader canvas that the unbundling of Gold Fields provides was too much to ignore.

There is also an ironic cyclicality to Froneman accepting the position since he started his career in 1984 as a junior engineer at Libanon on the west Rand, one of the mines that now comprises Sibanye Gold.

In many ways, Froneman is perfect for the job: he is technically solid, has a nose for a deal, and even if he flies close to the wind on occasion – as counterparts in the industry have claimed – he knows how to sell an investment story.

Here’s the highs and lows of Neal Froneman’s rollercoaster career:




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– Finweek