Almasar Minerals Ltd (AMK.AX) Appoints New Head of Exploration
Sydney, Sep 14, 2026 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Almasar Minerals Ltd (
ASX:AMK) is pleased to announce the appointment of highly experienced international exploration executive and discovery geologist Gokhan Yildiz as Head of Exploration, bringing extensive major-company exploration experience to Almasar's growing technical team.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Gokhan Yildiz appointed Head of Exploration
- Prior senior roles with First Quantum Minerals and Teck Resources.
- Proven discovery track record, across orogenic, porphyry and VMS systems
- Experience with US$30m+ exploration programs
Almasar appoints Gokhan Yildiz as Head of Exploration
Mr Yildiz previously served as Regional Exploration Lead for Europe and the Middle East at First Quantum Minerals, one of the world's leading copper mining groups. In this role, he led regional greenfields, brownfields and near-mine exploration activities, and opportunity generation across a large and geologically diverse region, including exploration evaluation of the Arabian Shield in Saudi Arabia, including field activities.
Prior to First Quantum, Mr Yildiz spent eight years with Teck Resources, progressing in roles spanning greenfields targeting, discovery, drilling, resource evaluation and regional-scale generative exploration. Together, these roles provide Mr Yildiz with more than a decade of major-company exploration experience.
Proven discovery credentials
During his career, Mr Yildiz gained experience across multiple copper, gold and zinc systems. At First Quantum Minerals, he led and contributed to the discovery, definition and advancement of Beretis Carlin-style Au, Cayeli satellite VMS Cu-Zn and Meskan Irish Type Zn-Pb opportunities. At Teck Resources, he contributed to the discovery and initial drill testing of the Kavaklitepe orogenic Au prospect, and discovery of the Kizil-Kral & TAKK orogenic gold prospects. Earlier, with Gentor Resources, he was part of the team that drill tested Hacimeter VMS Cu-Zn-Au-Ag prospect and discovered the Karaburun VMS Cu deposit, described as the largest known VMS deposit in Turkey.
His experience covers the exploration cycle from regional generative concepts and prospectivity analysis through mapping, geochemistry and geophysics, drill-target generation, discovery drilling, resource definition and project evaluation. Mr Yildiz's approach is strongly focused on camp-scale discovery, a philosophy that closely matches Almasar's strategy of applying modern exploration techniques across large, underexplored areas of the Arabian Shield to identify not simply individual anomalies, but potentially significant new mineral districts.
Building exploration operations at scale
Mr Yildiz also brings extensive experience establishing and executing large, complex exploration programs.
At First Quantum, he led, from inception, a major exploration program in Turkey that grew to approximately 200 personnel and 11 active drill rigs. This required the establishment and management of technical teams, contractors, core facilities, logistics, infrastructure and exploration systems, delivering approximate 70km of diamond drilling over 18 months. Across senior roles, Mr Yildiz has been responsible for exploration portfolios US$30+ million and has managed multidisciplinary technical teams across multiple projects and jurisdictions.
Major-company capability focused on Saudi Arabia
His major-company experience includes belt-to-camp scale portfolio review and generative exploration across the West Tethys, Arabian-Nubian Shield and selected copper basins, combining regional metallogenic analysis with systematic project generation and prioritisation.
Mr Yildiz's appointment significantly strengthens Almasar's senior technical capability as the Company moves from portfolio assembly and initial target generation into systematic field exploration and drilling. Together, Mr Yildiz and Almasar's industry and academic advisors bring complementary expertise across generative exploration, target development and field execution, providing Almasar with a strong technical platform to advance its growing exploration portfolio in Saudi Arabia.
Almasar Chief Executive Officer Brock Salier said:
"We set a high bar for this appointment, looking for someone trained in the world's leading exploration organisations, with direct discovery experience and a demonstrated ability to build and run large exploration programs. Gokhan delivers on all three. His philosophy of looking for the next mineral camp, rather than simply the next prospect, is how we think about Almasar's opportunity in Saudi Arabia. Following our recent ASX IPO, backed by global resources funds, Gokhan's background is an excellent fit as we build the technical and operational capability to match our ambition of becoming a much larger exploration company."
Mr Yildiz holds a BSc in Geological Engineering and MSc with High Honours from Middle East Technical University, with advanced postgraduate research in structural geology, microtectonics and shear zones.
Subject to the required approvals, Mr Yildiz will be issued 2.5 million options pursuant to the Company's Employee Securities Incentive Plan, exercisable at A$0.27 per share and expiring five years from the date of grant.
As Head of Exploration, Mr Yildiz will report directly to the CEO and assume overall responsibility for the Company's exploration programs.
About Almasar Minerals Ltd
Almasar Minerals (ASX:AMK) is an exploration company with 100% held gold and copper projects in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), bringing institutional mining expertise and discipline to frontier exploration.
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