At a ceremony today in Adelaide, South Australia, Boart Longyear Limited (ASX: BLY), the world's largest integrated mineral exploration products and services company, opened its new Asia Pacific Regional Headquarters, located on a greenfield site in Burbridge Business Park, adjacent to the Adelaide Airport. The new facility consolidates on a single site the Company’s former Adelaide premises at Mitchell Park and Lonsdale.

The Hon. Tom Koutsantonis, South Australian Minister for Manufacturing, Innovation & Trade and Minister for Mineral Resources & Energy officiated at the opening of the new facility, which houses some 160 employees.

The ceremony was also attended by Mr Steve Georganas MP, Federal Member for Hindmarsh, who represented the Minister for Innovation, Senator Kim Carr.

The Managing Director of AAL, Mr Mark Young, and many of BLY’s major customers and company officials were also present at the opening.

The new 7300 square metre facility co-located with the Deep Exploration Technologies Cooperative Research Centre (DET CRC), which, under the leadership of Prof. Richard Hillis, will deliver research programs in cheaper, safer and more environmentally-friendly ways to drill, analyse and target deep mineral deposits. With over $100 million in funding from the Australian Government and elsewhere, the DET CRC is the world’s best-resourced independent research initiative in mineral exploration.

Boart Longyear Operations

As well as housing Boart Longyear’s Asia Pacific Headquarters staff, the new Adelaide facility is home to Sales, Marketing, Finance, HR, Employee Health & Safety, Training, Operations and Engineering Support personnel, servicing large mining houses and mineral drilling contractors in Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, India, China, other Asian countries and parts of Africa.

The facility includes a 5300 square metre workshop which is a centre for the overhaul, repair and re-manufacture of the Asia Pacific drill rig fleet (some 200 rigs) and an R & D and Engineering Centre for large capital equipment (surface and underground mineral exploration drill rigs).

Mark Young welcomed the establishment of the new headquarters within Adelaide Airport’s Burbridge Business Park.

“The resources growth in this State will require facilities that are aligned to the demands of resources companies and the myriad of service industries that support them. Adelaide Airport’s vision is to meet that demand in a timely fashion with quality airport infrastructure and air service development,” Mr Young said.

“Boart Longyear has recognised the advantages of setting up its Asia Pacific headquarters in one of the airport’s business precincts due to our central location and excellent transport links.”

Prof. Hillis said "The aim of the Australian Government's Cooperative Research Centre program is to bring publicly-funded (e.g. University and CSIRO) researchers closer to industry. This is happening on a day-to-day basis thanks to the embedding of the head office of Deep Exploration Technologies CRC in the new Boart Longyear Facility."

Kent Hoots, Vice President Asia Pacific for Boart Longyear, noted that the new facility consolidates Boart Longyear’s Adelaide-based operations under one roof on an expanded and more efficient site.

“The development of this word-class facility was greatly assisted by $2 million in grant funding from the State Government. These funds have been applied to capital equipment expenditure such as cranes and test equipment.

“The skills mix of our employees in Adelaide has moved significantly in favour of highly-trained positions and this facility houses the single largest group of engineers in the Boart Longyear global engineering network”, Mr Hoots said.

Attachments:

Download Boart Longyear Asia Pacific Headquarters Fact Sheet ›

Download Deep Exploration Technologies CRC Fact Sheet ›

About Boart Longyear

Boart Longyear is a 120-year-old global mineral exploration company that provides mineral exploration services and drilling products for the global mining industry and also has a substantial drilling presence for water exploration, environmental sampling, energy, and oil sands exploration.

Headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, with 2010 sales of US$1.5 billion and over 9,000 employees worldwide, the company conducts contract drilling services in 40 countries, and

provides mining products to customers in over 100 countries. Regional offices and operations are located in Asia Pacific, EMEA, Latin America, and North America.

The company can be found on the Web at www.boartlongyear.com.

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