The rollout of PNG’s National Transmission Network is on track for completion later this year. It will transform the nation’s digital highway, but that does not mean there will not be challenges, telecommunications analyst Henry Lancaster tells Business Advantage PNG.
In a bid to promote skills formation in Papua New Guinea’s LNG sector Kumul Petroleum Academy, trading as South Pacific Employment Institute (SPEI), has signed a K9 million technician development agreement with ExxonMobil PNG.
Business Advantage International has announced the date for its next major PNG investment conference. The Business Advantage Papua New Guinea Investment Summit will be staged in Sydney in September 2017.
For the first time the uniforms of Papua New Guinea’s Olympic athletes have been fully made locally by a PNG-owned company. That company is Wantok Clothing and founder Genevieve Igara tells Business Advantage PNG that it has shown what is possible.
St Barbara recently announced that gold production from its Simberi mine in New Ireland rose by 39 per cent in the year to June: exceeding ‘the upper end of guidance.’ Managing Director Bob Vassie tells Business Advantage PNG that the company is looking to explore more in Papua New Guinea.
Trials have begun of a way to use the internet to improve the diagnosis of cancer biopsies. It is another PNG innovation that has grown out of the KumulGamechangers Competition, as entrant co-founder, Dr Rodney Itaki, explains to Business Advantage PNG.
The board of InterOil has accepted that the ExxonMobil bid is ‘superior’ to the bid by Oil Search. But the deal will not be completely finalised until a proposed shareholders’ meeting in September. And there are some legal obstacles that have to be dealt with.
Cruise liner tourism in PNG and the Solomon Islands could grow five-fold within two years, according to a study commissioned by the Australian Government, the IFC and cruise operator Carnival Australia. We asked the IFC’s Senior Operations Office, Dina Nicholas, what will make this growth happen.
ExxonMobil PNG may have trumped Oil Search’s bid for InterOil Corporation, but Papua New Guinea’s largest company will still benefit from the US major’s US$2.3 billion bid, according to Oil Search’s Managing Director Peter Botten. He tells Business Advantage PNG that the bid by ExxonMobil delivers most of the benefits of Oil Search’s take over offer and pushes the ‘cooperation agenda’.
The Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) says it is likely to put exploration licences out to international tender as a first step towards restarting the K177 billion Panguna gold and copper mine. Governor John Momis tells Business Advantage PNG he expects the ABG to take up Rio Tinto’s offer of shares, claiming that the national government should pass on the shares it was given by Rio to the ABG.