RE:cont...: holding steadyhttps://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=lobby.jsp&eventid=122520&sessionid=1&key=88CA190D4EF68BE917317355A66FE6E7&eventuserid=19964626
PHIL SKOLNICK, (OIL & GAS) ANALYST, GENUITY CAPITAL MARKETS:
Yeah, thanks. Are you advancing any other deals related to HTL aside from this one and the Tamarack and Athabasca?
ROBERT FRIEDLAND:
Well, we?re in detailed discussions, first and foremost, with a number of potential partners, both on Tamarack in Canada and on Pungarayacu. And some of these partners are interested in rolling out this technology worldwide - they're very, very large companies.
PHIL SKOLNICK, ANALYST, GENUITY CAPITAL MARKETS:
Are you gonna try ? I?m sorry?
ROBERT FRIEDLAND:
First we're talking about negotiations with partners to advance the technology specifically at these two locations in Canada and Ecuador.
But in parallel with those discussions, we have been in detailed discussions with a number of sovereign governments and their related, national oil companies. And it's getting to be a very long list, but as we've announced, we are in detailed discussions with governments in the Middle East. We discussed that we are in discussions with governments in Latin Americaand in other parts of the world. Given that the HTL technology is largely identical - with only minor variations from different fields - given that the technology is going to be rolled out globally, we are constantly in discussions with parties from all over the world.
PHIL SKOLNICK:
Are you seeing increased interest within Canada at all, in the Athabasca region?
ROBERT FRIEDLAND:
Yes. Well obviously, given the enormous disruption in the financial markets and the concomitant correction in oil, from say 140 to $80 or $70 a barrel, a number of the well-known bitumen resources are increasingly stranded in Canada, and they really need our technology, so we're getting a large amount of interest from stranded oil fields in Canada, both for the economic aspects and the environmental advantages of our technology.
And we're getting an enormous amount of interest since we announced this Pungarayacu validation of our technology with an OPEC member.
There are a number of OPEC countries at the level of their national oil companies that are keenly watching this development. And I think it's fair to say that this validation is intensifying the discussions with a number of other sovereign governments. As you may know -- I think the questioner may know ? that most of the world's remaining, significant oil reserves are not held by people like Exxon and Shell. They are rather held by national oil companies like Petroecuador, or the Saudi National Oil Company, or the Kuwait National Oil Company, or the Libyan National Oil Company. It's these national oil companies that need this technology to unlock this type of reserves globally.
Now there are other players that are consumers, that are national oil companies in Japan or China for example, that are trying to keep their very large Asian population supplied with oil. And so the right marriage is the end market and the sovereign countries that own the technology, and Ivanhoe, as an operator and technology provider.
So we're going to be in these sorts of discussions for a long time and that's why we've developed a financial and business model that enables us to scale these opportunities without diluting the Ivanhoe Energy shareholders - by bringing in strategic partners at a level of the specific, new project host.
Does that sort of answer your question?
PHIL SKOLNICK:
Nope, that totally answers my question. Thank you.
ROBERT FRIEDLAND:
Great - thank you.