ray clark

Ray is CEO and founder of the group. He is a former Executive Director of De Beers and has been involved in almost every aspect of the diamond business for over 40 years.

During his time spent in the London office of the Diamond Trading Company (the marketing arm of De Beers) he gained experience of virtually every aspect of De Beers’ marketing activities including diamond stock control, sorting and valuing, sales, PR, marketing and advertising

Ray was seconded to the IT department with the aim of establishing a new Management Information Division which would be able to forecast individual sales categories of diamonds based on models for individual mines that were purchased through De Beers’ own mines or through sales agreements with other producing countries such as Russia and Australia.

In 1992 he established the office of De Beers Russia in Moscow and was responsible for managing the De Beers/Alrosa relationship, purchasing annually around $1 billion of rough diamonds from the Russian state company now known as Alrosa. During his time with De Beers in Russia, Ray spearheaded a Russian joint venture which purchased a controlling share in the Lomonosov kimberlite mine in the north west region of Russia. He was also appointed CEO of Arkangel Diamond Corporation, a Canadian company listed on the TSX exchange in Toronto which had entered into a joint venture with the Russian oil company Lukoil to develop the Verkhotina kimberlite pipe.

Since leaving De Beers, Ray has continued to live and work in Russia, working closely with industry specialists mainly on projects based in Russia.

ANDREW CARTWRIGHT

With a solid military and commercial background, Andrew brings his vast experience of working in the Former Soviet Union, Arabia and Africa. 

He has worked directly for Head’s of State and within the highest echelons of government. An innovative architect of win win solutions, Andrew was tasked to re-deploy surplus military resources in Sudan. He established new and thriving commercial, medical, industrial and agricultural hubs, thus utilising a skilled resource whilst, at the same time, neutralising a potential threat to national security.  

During Perestroika, Andrew facilitated the supply of fixed wing and rotary aircraft from the Russian Federation and Former Soviet Union to Africa. 

His focus has been on the more challenging countries in Africa such as Sudan, Libya, Nigeria and Zimbabwe. For example he was instrumental in the settlement of the historical Libyan/Russian Debt. 

jonathan dickman

Jonathan is a senior UK qualified international corporate and commercial lawyer with extensive experience of global mining and natural resource sectors gained at leading companies and law firms such as De Beers, Rio Tinto and Norton Rose. He has 20 years experience of metals, minerals and energy sectors with 15 years experience of the diamond sector.

Jonathan has wide experience in both developed and emerging markets, in particular Russia and CIS. He is a former CEO of a TSX-listed junior mining company with interests in Russia.

He has wide-ranging experience handling complex, multi faceted and multi-jurisdictional transactions, negotiations and dispute resolution across different legal and business cultures.

Jonathan is a fluent Russian and French speaker and has a good working knowledge of both Portuguese and German.

yury serokurov

A graduate of the Moscow Geological Institute (MGRI) specialising in the exploration of rare minerals and radioactive deposits. Yury worked for 20 years in the Soviet exploration company Geologorazvedka as Head of forecasting and exploration of Uranium deposits throughout the USSR. During this tenure, Yury began specialising in the field of remote sensing (analysing structures of the earth’s crust aimed at identifying the optimum geological parameters for the formation of rare earth mineral deposits.

 With the break up of the Soviet Union, state funding of the institute came to a halt and Yury was forced to find financing from elsewhere. He continued to enhance the work on his sensing program, designing his own set of algorithms using in house IT. As the reputation of the institute grew, it was privately contracted to carry out remote sensing analysis in Russia, China, Canada and Africa. One of his biggest clients was Alrosa and his methodology was key in the discovery of the Catoca kimberlite in Angola for which he was given a special acknowledgement and recognition by the Russian Federation.

The key plus factor in Yury’s unique methodology is that it brings both speed and cost effectiveness to the field of exploration which is otherwise known to be a costly and time consuming discipline.

Yury is a Doctor of Science and an Academician which is the highest scientific body in Russia.

pavel shelkov

Pavel is a graduate of the Moscow Geological Institute specialising in exploration. He led a Soviet state run expedition looking for diamond deposits on the border of Russia and China. Following the break up of the Soviet Union, financing was discontinued in the region and Pavel was able to secure funding from private investors for several concessions in the region. Under his leadership, these concessions were sampled and the reserves proven up after which they were successfully sold on, giving the investors a favourable return.

In 2007 he led an expedition which discovered a gold deposit in the Novgorod region. His company partnered with BHP Billiton on a diamond project in the Murmansk region.

More recently, he led an expedition to the Kola Peninsular which resulted in the discovery of the ‘Fortuna' kimberlite.

Pavel has been a close associate of Newbidge’s founder, Ray Clark for more than 15 years and they have partnered together in green field prospecting ventures in the far east of Russia as well as the evaluation of a rich alluvial deposit along the Muna river in Yakutia adjacent to where Alrosa are currently mining.

 Pavel is a consumate geologist whose hands on style has earned him a justifiable reputation of being a ‘must have’ on any exploration project in Russia.

yury podkuiko

Yury is a practical geologist and mining engineer. He has been head of exploration and mining on several deposits in Kazakstan (gold, titanium, diamonds and other rare earth minerals) during Soviet times.

Later he was appointed head of the Mineralogical Laboratory in the Urals region of Russia, tasked with directing exploration and mining works for alluvial gold deposits, diamonds and metal ores.

He worked for Alrosa in the far east of Russia where he was chief geologist for ‘Alrosa Primorie’.

Yury specialised in the analysis of magnetic anomalies in the search for kimberlites in the Arkangel region of Russia where he was the author of studies on the economic potential of the Lomonosov kimberlites which are today being mined by Alrosa.

He was later tasked with heading the Luele expedition in Angola. Here he was responsible for reviewing aero-magnetic anomalies through grid sampling, drilling and micro diamond analysis. Under his leadership, more than 30 kimberlites were discovered which included the ‘Luaxi072’ one of the largest kimberlites in the world which is currently being mined by Alrosa and Endiama.

alexander fomin

Alexander has over 40 years of work experience as a geologist, the largest part working for Alrosa between 1976 and 2003. There he worked as a petrographer and was later head of Alrosa’s analytical laboratory. He was lead geologist in the Amakinsk, Aikhal and Botubinsky expeditions which led to the discovery of major new world class kimberlites in the Siberian autonomous Republic of Yakutia.

Alexander later worked in Angola on the kimberlite pipes Kamachi, Kamazhiku and Catoca.

The author of more than 40 publications around the world and the holder of 3 registered patents; ‘The quantitive evaluation of kimberlite bodies’, ‘Methods of searching for kimberlite bodies and evaluation of their predictive parameters’ and ‘Method of prospecting diamondiferous areas and kimberlite fields’

Alexander’s unique methods for predicting the most prospective areas utilises a combination of geological and drainage network maps based on the hypothesis that the drainage network reflects the planetary fracturing of the earth’s crust. Magma rises to the surface along these weakened zones.

This method is also used for forecasting gold, silver, diamonds, copper zinc lead and platinum.