Good morning, and welcome to the Oracle Power PLC Q1 trading update investor presentation. Throughout this recorded presentation, investors will be in listen-only mode. Questions are encouraged and can be submitted at any time using the Q&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 will review all questions submitted today and publish responses where it is appropriate to do so. Before we begin, I would like to submit the following poll. I would now like to hand you over to CEO Naheed Memon. Good morning to you.
Good morning, and thank you. I am very pleased to be giving this update to our shareholders and investor supporters. I think this particular update is important because it also spells out a direction that the company is taking, and that is towards the development of more green energy projects. That would then going forward become the core of our portfolio. Having said that, we'll still continue to develop and to suitably close out our non-core assets and some of which still have great potential. It's important to sort of convey that going forward, we would be only growing our portfolio through the acquisition or through the development of more green energy projects.
Having said that, I'd like to begin today with giving a very short, brief snapshot of what our strategy is gonna be looking like, beginning with our green hydrogen project and, I believe, which is something that we have a lot of interest in, and it is driving us forward. It is immensely important and valuable. We have achieved a lot in a very short span of time. I would just like to share some of that with you based on just the last quarter. What the last quarter shows you is just a glimpse of what has already been done.
We started off by signing an offtake agreement with a non-binding MoU with EGA, which is one of the world's largest aluminum smelters, owned by the government of Abu Dhabi. Offtake is key because you know to sort of commercialize this commodity and to make our project bankable, this is a very important step in that direction. We also managed to raise half a million pounds and you know we could have actually raised more at that time, and there was a demand. Given the state of the markets at that time, and given the point at which we were at, we did not want to do so at that rate that we were getting the funds in.
We just got what we required and so that we can carry on developing the project and bringing it to where we believe will start delivering value for our shareholders. A very, very significant development that occurred in the last quarter was the signing of a strategic MoU with the State Grid Corporation of China, and that is the third largest company in the world by revenue after Amazon and Walmart. This company is not just a you know a contractor or an engineering company, et cetera. It is a mega investor, and it's come in to collaborate with us with a view to develop, to invest, to jointly market green hydrogen.
With it sort of coming on board, we also then can count on the support, financing support, et cetera, which will, you know, very soon become our next agenda item. Having, you know, sort of a view to the future, we also signed an MoU with a fuel cell company which develops fuel cell engines for industrial power called Doosan in Korea. I think our shareholders would be aware that we've sort of developed a very good nexus, and we have very good linkages and some very, very useful relationships in Korea and in some other countries. This one in Doosan with Doosan can in the future become very, very important as we sort of start to develop applications for our commodity in Pakistan and elsewhere.
This is a partnership, a relationship that we're looking at a much more regional and global level as well, and not just limited to our current project. This part in the space and, I think I'll also take this opportunity to say that we do believe in this space, and we believe that green hydrogen is a fuel for the future. We are setting ourselves to become a potential supplier and a very, I believe, if I can say this, hopefully a very important stakeholder in the hydrogen, green hydrogen ecosystem. This relationship spells and speaks to that.
Another very significant achievement for us in the last quarter, with respect to our green hydrogen project, was that although we had acquired the land, but there is a whole process, which sort of has to be undertaken before the land lease is actually awarded and then sits as an asset on our, on our balance sheet, that we have now got the land lease. It's been registered, in the registry, in the government registry and so on. This process too was completed in this quarter.
This is important because it then leads us to the next step, which I pointed out earlier, and that is for financing and ensuring that we can actually complete our investment consortium and also then bring on our financiers and lenders. In terms of the project's visibility, recognition, et cetera, we've actually made a lot of progress. In this quarter, we also became the associated partners of Dii Desert Energy Alliance. This is a forum, a partnership nexus in which all the biggest companies of the world in energy sit, and now we sit amongst them and this allows us to develop very meaningful offtake financing, collaborative relationships, and we are already very engaged through them and with them.
This too leads us to a position where a lot of our efforts to convert our project into a you know into a live commodity producing facility becomes much more real. I can also safely say that it also expedites and helps us get there sooner. In terms of the overall strategy. The last one or two years have been very important for us, and we have taken a view that we would like, and we believe that this is the right time to develop projects which are in the more green and renewable energy space.
This is in alignment with a global trend as well as the call and the need that all countries, governments, businesses have to in some fashion align themselves with the net zero carbon goals. Oracle has taken, you know, a sort of, I would say a very, very quick step forward. It has, you know, it's a first mover in Pakistan, and I would say also in the region in terms of the size and scale, we are one of the biggest for the green hydrogen project. We've moved very forward in this direction. In fact, today, this morning, I've got messages from people who sit in the capital of Pakistan, in government and outside that your project is of national interest, et cetera.
There's a lot of interest globally as well as in Pakistan for this project, and we do want to continue to expand our footprint in this way. We are looking to build stronger partnerships with industry leaders, and we've already demonstrated that. ThyssenKrupp, for example, is one of the biggest ammonia and hydrogen companies in the world, and they've been in this business of ammonia for, you know, more than a century. I mean, if I can quote that their CEO had said to me, and it took us a while to bring them on board because they are very serious. When they do come on board and to quote him, he said, "We get propositioned all the time, but we never really say yes unless we believe in the project and its prospects.
when we do come in, we don't leave. That's, you know, that sort of is one example of the type of relationship that we have built, and a relationship which is already delivering for us. The studies are ongoing, and we've already had our mid study review meetings, et cetera. All of that is going in full swing. It's moving forward. State Grid, as I already mentioned, is a global enterprise. Them on board, they bring not just finance, expertise, connectivity, you know, global relationships, et cetera.
For a company like us to have them on board is in itself, you know, a huge success that we have because they see the potential in the project, and they believe they'll be the right partners to work with. We've already done a fair amount of work. We've already got there. We've already, I would say, the stage one, whereby you get the project together, we've already covered all of that. We are now moving ahead, and they have decided to join hands with us, which is fantastic. I said Doosan Fuel Cell, that's innovation in every way. We don't want to be out of the space where we are also looking at futuristic solutions which speak to applications going forward, et cetera.
We wanna be a part of this nexus as well because it provides revenue streams for us going forward as we progress. I think that there is a clear recognition of the hydrogen as a commodity, where it stands, what the current market value is in terms of the entire sort of industrial value right now for hydrogen. I mean, you know, it's huge. The entire industry, gray, blue, green hydrogen, et cetera. The demand is forecasted to grow exponentially. It's GBP 130 billion now, and by 2050 it's expected to be GBP 660 billion. There is no looking back here as countries and businesses continue to transition. On that note, this transitioning, by the way, is going to be legalized.
I know that in Europe there will be an energy transition and a sort of decarbonization program that is going to be put into place. Then all your big industries will have no choice but to transition to using hydrogen to burn, to co-fire as a fuel and also for applications such as transport, et cetera. All of that is not too far away in the future, and we as a company can see that, and hence we are moving in that direction so aggressively and making the right steps forward. We believe that this is the future, and this is the right time and the right place to be here, right in the middle of this, and we've already demonstrated our commitment to this.
Having said that, we hold very valuable assets which are in the space, in the hydrocarbon space, and we are looking at very I would say good strategy and I hope I'm able to very quickly update our shareholders that how will we deliver value in that space as well and how we'll monetize and divest in a way that delivers the best value to them for the investments that they have made based on these assets. That is something that is already work in progress, and there will be results very soon.
We believe that we have taken a leap and taken the first step in the sort of most important aspect of green energy development and the most sort of I would say dominant energy transition mechanism and that is the production of green hydrogen, which goes even beyond just simple renewable power generation. This is the direction that we wanna take the company in, expand our footprint and our investors and our one of our significant investors, shareholders, His Highness, is fully supportive of this strategy and would like us to grow our footprint as we keep moving forward. When we start to deliver, this is not gonna be the end of the line, and this is how we will continue to grow as a company.
You know, I will be very, very sort of hopeful and I'll remain grateful to you for your support and also your belief in this vision that we have with a view to the future, not just for the company, but also for all businesses going forward globally. On that note, I think I can hand it back to our moderator.
Naheed-
Thank you.
Thank you very much indeed for your presentation. Ladies and gentlemen, please continue to submit your questions using the Q&A tab situated on the top right corner of your screen. While the company take a few moments to review those questions submitted today, I would like to remind you that a recording of this presentation, along with a copy of the slides and the published Q&A, can be accessed via our investor dashboard. Naheed, if I may hand back to you for the Q&A and kindly 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.
All right. Thank you very much. Someone just sent through a question, which I'll pick up, I think, before I go to the pre-submitted ones. I'm not sure if I can go through all, but I'll try my best. Yes, there is a concern, not a concern, but it just says we want to know, and fair enough, we want to know what's happening with Thar Block VI and gold. A lot is happening with Thar Block VI, and we have an announced strategy for gold as well. I'll very happily just very quickly go over that. Gold is quicker. We had two projects there.
We drilled and, as you well know, with drilling programs, we take a view, and one of them turned out to be fantastic, one of them turned out to be not so great. The one that's turned out to be fantastic, that's Northern Zone. It's proven to be a, I mean, it hopefully will be a mine, an economical mine with a large mineralization, low grade, similar to, say, the Boddington Mine. That's the view that our geologists have taken based on all the drilling and all the reports that we have, and we're looking for a joint venture partner to continue to develop and divest our stake and take that development forward, by holding and retaining a value which is then can be delivered to our shareholders.
We are in conversation with JV partners, and we believe that a local JV partner will bring a lot of expertise and the bandwidth to actually make this successful. That's the direction for Northern Zone. For Jhandi East, we had drilled first for gold, then we checked for all other minerals. Although there have been some positive results, but not positive enough for us to continue drilling there. Hence, as a company, we decided that we should not really enter into another massive drilling program there. We are in conversation with our team to see how best we should be able to then step out of this project and not develop it further.
That is also something that we have informed our shareholders and that we will not be spending more money drilling at Jhandi East. In fact, we will try and see how best we can step out of that and focus on Northern Zone and see how that becomes. Hopefully that will, in fact, if I can share even today, I've had very good conversations. That is moving forward, and hopefully we should be able to give the shareholders some good news on that front. Thar Block VI today is. I've shared some of this in our update that we are looking at development for Thar Block VI. Post-quarter, we announced that we have started the development of 1 GW solar project at Thar Block VI.
We signed an MOU for the collaboration and for development with the largest power contractor in Pakistan, PowerChina International, which has also worked with us initially on a green hydrogen project. We've started working with them, and we're working with the government of Sindh, which owns the mining asset, the land and the resource there, to see how this utilization can be done. We've also secured initial permission from the government of Sindh for doing this.
One gigawatt is massive, so it's a big solar plant and this is not in any way compromising our current asset, which is our mine, which exists, Block VI, and which is 1.4 billion tons of lignite coal, et cetera, which has been established, and that was a project that this company has been developing for a long time. Well, the good news there is that that doesn't go anywhere, and in fact, there has been a certain change in the regime here for project and power development. I believe that we should be able to update our shareholders even on that front as to how we will be able to monetize our investments in that and how we'll be able to deliver value for that as well.
This is just to confirm that in no way is something that we are giving up on. I wouldn't, and I don't think that we would just completely abandon it. We can't because it has so much potential going forward. In fact, I would say it has more potential today than it had three months ago or even last year or any other time. But our strategy as a company is now to focus more on green energy projects. Going forward, our projects are gonna be green, but these assets remain and are continuing a sort of a strategic development path and in fact, on very good timelines. Hopefully we should be able to update shareholders with developments in that front, on that sort of front as well.
Now I'll just go to some pre-submitted questions. The first question is to do with our fundraising and the trend to raise funds at a discount and of course the fall in share price and all of that is all bunched together. Well, some of this is cyclical, of course. This is not just something that is to do with our company. I'm not making excuses, I'm not just saying that, you know, bunch us up with everybody else because we're not everybody else, and we would very much like for you to, you know, invest in the company because it is more valuable. I also understand that the way we raise funds or the way we've managed to sort of get capital to continue to develop, you know, has been at a discount.
We've tried our best to ensure that it is as less as possible, but we have not been able to to sort of prevent the sort of share price from slipping to a lower level and. I believe that has a lot to do with the sort of development path of our projects. Because there has been a delay in the development of the initial principal singular project that was at Thar Coal Block VI, everything else that has happened has not had enough time to sort of start to capture value. I think that you have.
You can see the speed at which we're working now and the sort of kind of bandwidth that we have developed, the partnerships that we have and the commitments that we have from our partners that you know we believe that we will move very quickly towards success in the areas that we are now working in. The price fall and the sort of loss in value has to do with the historical delay that the company has faced in its sort of efforts to develop its core singular project. I believe this is going to change very soon as our new focus and our new greener projects start to move across the finish line.
As I've already explained, that our strategic path for the non-core assets are that's sort of realized, and I'm fully confident that that will be realized as well, as we move forward. Okay. Lots of talk and no real action. Well, I think in the last quarter there has been. Just in those three months, there have been like 3-f months, a lot has already been done and achieved, and we have updated the market in terms of partnerships, in terms of studies, in terms of on ground work, et cetera.
Now, if action is considered to be the real sort of, you know, production of something, then we are a project development company, and we are putting a very complex and, probably one of the largest projects in Pakistan and in the region together. Just to give you an idea, we have very large projects on our portfolio. Thar Coal Block VI is $ a few billion, the green hydrogen project, et cetera. The network, the nexus, the financing arrangements and the permissions required for projects of this are complex, and we've done a lot of work for both and therefore hopefully you will see the results.
That has all come together. You know, I mean, that's all I will say, that we continue to update the market and we try our very best that the market remains updated of all the work that is going on ground. I can say that it is going on ground, on all our projects. All, whether it's Western Australia or it's Pakistan, and wherever we are and whoever is involved. Our CTO sits in Glasgow. He's, you know, as involved on the project in green hydrogen as I am. We have a team, and everyone is fully committed to delivering, and delivering success and carrying out their job, with a view to making sure that value is delivered. There was an update regarding the gold projects.
I've just said that, and there were RNSs, and we have continued to update the market. The question is, why wasn't there an update regarding the gold project? There was an update regarding the gold project. We are continuously talking about the sort of permission that we have been seeking. We have updated the market about the IGCEP, which is the demand supply plan for the government of Pakistan. We just updated the market about the plan to develop the solar plant on the Thar Block VI, which is what you refer to as the gold project. There hasn't been any lapse in updates as far as that is concerned.
I'm sorry if it is being felt that we have not updated the market enough, but we are regulated, and we cannot be updating the market unless and until there is something very material. It's not possible to keep updating the market on discussions that we have or work which is just in progress. We can only go to the market when things are firm, and we are able to confirm the news in a way that matters. Okay. I'm not the only one who works. There's a question. I'll translate it in a way which is probably better, but it simply says that, what are the other directors doing, and am I the only one? Of course not. I mean, I can't. I have 24 hours in a day, and there is a lot that I need to do.
I simply cannot do it on my own. We have people. We have a team of people. The other directors also are doing their part in terms of guiding, in terms of assessing, in terms of working on the strategy, but they're non-executives. If you're talking about the independent directors, they cannot be involved in the operations. That is not their job. As far as the operations are concerned, we have, you know, different people. In Western Australia, we have a team. We have a geologist. We have a geochemist, et cetera. A whole setup. The drilling programs and all the work that we did there couldn't just happen with me sitting far away. There is a team of people on ground for the green hydrogen project.
There are a number of people who are involved, including a hydrogen fuel scientist and engineers, et cetera, who work closely with me. It's a technical lead kind of, you know. It's a project which is based on new technology, a lot of engineering, a lot of science, et cetera. So a lot of people need to play a part. These things are being done based on contributions from many different people. So it's not just me at all. In fact, I would say that a lot of this happens because of the support that I have. There's a question about we stopped the director purchase plan, and then the question about one of our directors who sold his shares, et cetera.
We stopped the director share purchase program for the simple reason that we explained in our RNS, and it's a fact. I really wanted this to continue. It had just become difficult in the sense that there were these. I don't know if you understand. This program is like the broker, the nominated broker or the broker who conducts this program buys shares on our behalf, on the directors' behalf. There are certain regulatory issues in this mechanism. That's why you won't see this happening all the time, and not all companies do this because it requires a certain sort of clearance. It also is expensive because the fee that they charge had started to go up a lot.
In fact, I mean, you know, you would buy someone's 10% may equate to GBP 200 or GBP 300, and the fee that we were paying was GBP 500 per year, et cetera. It really wasn't economical, and wasn't delivering enough for us in terms of the return as well. It's better that we continue to participate, and we continue to buy shares outside of this program for now. Having said that, we're still trying to see whether we can put another program together, maybe which is slightly better in terms of what it brings forth, and it's more economical. That is why we stopped it for now. The reference to one of our ex-directors, an independent director who sold his shares, et cetera.
Well, we announced that and that was personal circumstances. We really are unable to manage or control people's personal circumstances. The responsibility lies with people and individuals to sort of uphold the commitments that they make, and that's all I'll be able to say. The circumstances, his personal circumstances changed, and that's why he had to leave the company as well. I'm not sure whether this is an appropriate time to share this, but then he has since then passed away as well. I mean, I guess things happen to people in their lives. Okay. There's a question about when are we gonna see further purchase by the Sheikh and the director as well.
As I said, we remain committed to participating, and we shall be able to do so at the right time, and we'll update the market, as and when that is, and we are clear to do so. We have, again, there's a question about all the different questions. I just sort of I think there's some questions being repeated, but I think I probably have covered everything. Again, there's a question about the share price and, I think I've addressed that. We recognize that, and we remain committed to delivering value, and we do really hope, and we wish, and we will do everything possible to ensure that it gets back to a level that gives people confidence. I think I can conclude and, if there are,
Yeah. Yes, absolutely.
If there are other questions, then I'll be happy to sort of respond to them, and we can submit the answers as you mentioned earlier.
Perfect, Naheed. I think, yeah, as you said, you have addressed those questions you can for investors today. Of course, the company will review all questions submitted today and will publish those responses on the Investor Meet Company platform. Before redirecting investors to provide you with their feedback, which is particularly important to the company, Naheed, could I please ask you for a few closing comments?
Thank you very much. Thank you for hosting this today, and I'm very, very grateful to everyone who joined in for their time and for listening in, for even sending through the questions and for giving us an opportunity to sort of share and to make clear how we plan to move forward. In summary, we are all working literally around the clock. We remain committed to growing this company and to ensuring that everyone's investment in this company becomes, you know, sort of, more lucrative and everyone is sort of at the end of it rewarded by investing in Oracle.
I hope that our shareholders continue to support us into the long term and grow, and help us grow the company, you know, in alignment with the vision that we have and in accordance with the general trend that we see globally. Once again, thank you very much, and we will keep the market updated as and when we keep moving things forward.
That's great, Naheed. Thank you once again for updating investors today. Could I please ask investors not to close this session, as you will 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 Oracle Power PLC, we would like to thank you for attending today's presentation. That concludes today's meeting. Good afternoon to you all.