In this article, together with Tamara Golovina, Managing Partner of the First Junior Accelerator and Vice President of Hartland Group of Companies, we will understand what a junior is in reality, and where exactly the Russian junior chain breaks down – in licensing, financing, rules of the game, or in the quality of the projects themselves. <\/p>\n
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<\/a>Who took over the search for new deposits and when<\/h2>\n\n
A hundred years ago, large deposits were often found almost by chance – by ore outcrops on the surface or traces of old workings. The scale of industry was different, metal consumption<\/a> was incomparably less, and there was simply no need to constantly replenish reserves. <\/p>\n\n The situation changed in the second half of the 20th century. Metallurgy grew, infrastructure projects expanded, and demand for metals shaped the industrialized economy. Reserves began to be produced faster than new sites were opened. It became clear: prospecting could no longer be episodic, it had to be continuous. <\/p>\n\n By the 1980s, major Western mining companies faced a new challenge. Early-stage exploration was proving too costly and too risky for business. Drilling did not always lead to discoveries, budgets were rising, and shareholders were demanding predictable returns. Companies began to cut back on exploration programs, but the need for new deposits was not going away. Someone still had to take the risk early in the exploration phase. <\/p>\n\n This is how the market model was formed: private finance came into the search and forecasting stage, and small teams appeared, working as start-ups<\/a>. This is how the junior segment was born. <\/p>\n\n The Soviet Union once followed a different path. The state fully financed exploration<\/a>, formed a powerful network of enterprises and created the resource base itself. Similar principles are now in effect in China, where the early stages are financed by the state and large state corporations. Such a model is possible only with large-scale budget expenditures and centralized management of the entire system. <\/p>\n\n Modern Russia is between these two approaches. The budget no longer finances geological exploration on the scale of the USSR, but we are not reproducing the Chinese centralized model either. At the same time, the need for new deposits has not disappeared – the existing reserves are depleting, and the mining and processing plants must work. <\/p>\n\n If the economy is a market economy, it means that early geological risk should be financed by private capital, and such a model requires a clear stage, transparency, a measurable result and a clear exit point. This is why Russia needs juniors in any case. <\/p>\n Before examining why the junior chain is stalling in Russia, it is important to agree on terms. A junior is not a “small exploration company”, but a project at the early stages of exploration, which operates like a startup. It has no reserve of money and time, so it lives according to the logic of stages: there is a geological hypothesis \u2192 data is needed \u2192 the next round of investment is attracted for this data. <\/p>\n\n Junior can’t afford to “search for the sake of process.” If the season has passed<\/a> and there is no data that strengthens the hypothesis and increases the value of the asset, the financing ends. Junior has to think pragmatically: each stage must produce a result that can be shown to the investor. <\/p>\n\n Hence the main conclusion: juniors are obliged to be technological<\/a> – not because it is fashionable, but because it is their way of survival. Tamara Golovina formulates it as a task of efficiency: “minimum time and minimum resources – but maximum exploration result”.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n Strong juniors have a normal logic: not to stretch the work over years, but to close the maximum in one season – aerogeophysics, geochemistry, fast methods of sampling and analysis, small-size drilling. This is not an attempt to “save money”, but a way to quickly and accurately test a hypothesis while the project is still alive. <\/p>\n\n Tamara Golovina cites an example that greatly inspired her in her time: the junior company SolGold Plc and its project in Ecuador. The discovery was non-trivial in terms of geology: the ore body was “blind” and did not come to the surface. When the first encouraging results appeared, the team did not rush to drill “wherever they could”. <\/p>\n\n They performed geochemistry<\/a> and used field methods to diagnose indicator minerals for metasomatic zonation in interpreting the anomalies.<\/p>\n\n They did geophysics, interpreted it long and carefully, and studied the composition of the technical ore to build a model of the site. Tamara emphasizes: it looked innovative, and yet it costs almost nothing, because the samples have already been taken. The next question is how to “read” them correctly, for example, by building a model of the metasomatic zonation of the porphyry system. <\/p>\n\n The strongest part of the story is the logistics. High mountains, jungle, only helicopter access<\/a>, and the project had only six points from which to drill. A mistake here would have cost the season and the budget. So the team made a successful move: instead of field improvisations, they spent a year or a year and a half designing special drilling rigs for the site conditions. So that the first 300-400 meters would be auger drilling, and further on they would switch to diamond drilling. And the rig had to be collapsible – so much so that it could be transported to the drilling points literally on donkeys. <\/p>\n In Russia, junior logic has been tried to be built into the licensing system<\/a> through the application principle. Its meaning is to lower the entry barrier. A company submits a package of documents and receives a license without participating in an auction, unlike “expensive” sites, where the right to use subsoil is played out at auction and requires large expenditures. <\/p>\n\n According to Tamara Golovina, the idea was rational: to give the market an opportunity to quickly take plots under hypothesis and verify them by works, instead of years of “keeping in the head”.<\/p>\n\n “A license on the application principle is obtained practically free of charge. It takes effort to form a package of documents, but financially it is definitely not money for mining companies,” she says.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n In practice, the mechanism worked differently. The low entry threshold did indeed produce growth. Only the number of licenses grew, not the number of operating projects. At the beginning of 2025, there were about 23,600 licenses in Russia, of which about 12,000 were for solid minerals (almost three times as many as ten years ago). At the same time, the number of sites is not equal to the number of active operations. <\/p>\n\n Rosnedra estimates that juniors have about 57% of licenses issued on an application basis, but about 32% are financed. A significant part of sites are assigned to companies, but are not accompanied by real geological exploration. This is the key gap in the Russian model: there is a license, but no project. <\/p>\n\n It is important to emphasize, the problem is not simplification itself. The application principle itself does not create distortions in the market, it is only an access tool. The failure starts at the moment when the license ceases to be an entry point to the project and becomes an independent asset. <\/p>\n\n “These are sites that have been frozen for 5-7 years. Someone got a license, but they don’t work there and, most importantly, they weren’t going to work there. It’s like people re-buying theater tickets and then reselling them,” says Tamara Golovina.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n When a license is used by junior logic, it starts a cycle: hypothesis \u2192 works \u2192 data \u2192 next step or closure. When a license becomes a territorial asset, the cycle stops: the plot can be held, resold, “carried in a portfolio”, but no data is created. <\/p>\n\n This irritation can also be heard in the professional environment. Under the ads for the sale of plots there are comments along the lines of: “I did not put anything there myself and did not bury it, but I think that there are 5-7 tons of gold there. Buy me (expensive)…” – and “There are more than 95% of such companies now – they have taken plots and are essentially selling air”. <\/p>\n At the same time, Tamara emphasizes that not all “dormant” licenses are a story of bad faith. There is another reason. The system is organized in such a way that it is almost impossible to get out of a project quickly. By obtaining a license, the company immediately assumes a long commitment to the work plan, deadlines and reporting. If the hypothesis is not confirmed or the money is not found, the site is still “hanging” on the balance sheet and is effectively frozen for years. <\/p>\n\n Hence, Tamara has a practical suggestion that could reduce this effect: to make a separate short license format – conditionally for a year or “500 days<\/a> ” – just for hypothesis testing. Such a license would give the right to perform a limited set of works (for example, geological routes, samples, geophysics, geochemistry – without drilling), quickly obtain primary data and then make a decision. <\/p>\n\n The logic is simple:<\/p>\n\n Essentially, it would be a mechanism for rapid hypothesis testing – the ability to test ideas so that each failure does not result in a long-term site lockout.<\/p>\n\n Let’s imagine northern Canada. Forest, lakes, short season. Thousands of people “wander” through these territories. Some are professional geologists with experience, some have taken a short course and know how to distinguish a sulfide mineral from a waste rock. Most of these attempts end in nothing. But sometimes one of them changes the map of the industry. This is what happened with the discovery of diamond deposits in northwestern Canada<\/a>, a discovery that eventually made the country one of the world leaders in diamond mining. <\/p>\n\n The mechanism is simple: mass participation creates the probability of a result. Is it possible to imagine such a model in Russia? Most likely not. And it’s not just about regulation – the logic of the system itself is organized differently. A license here is not a “test of a pen”, but a serious obligation. A spontaneous flow of people with devices into the forests is impossible, both by law and by the culture of the industry. However, Tamara Golovina does not believe that simply increasing the number of initiatives is enough to solve the problem. <\/p>\n\n “Everything is really different here – both the remoteness and the strictness of the rules,” she says. In her opinion, relying only on the masses will not work in Russian conditions. Discoveries do not emerge out of chaos unless they have professional training behind them. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n In the Russian reality, “juniors from scratch” hardly ever appear. More often than not, viable projects grow up alongside an already operating service or consulting company<\/a>. Such a structure has cash flow, specialists, access to data, software, and an operating base. This allows you to finance the first works with your own resources and not start a conversation with an investor from the position of “we only have an idea and a license”. <\/p>\n The team is there. The geological idea is there. We also have an understanding of what to do in the field in the first season. And then it’s not geology, but the most prosaic question: where to get the money? <\/strong> <\/p>\n\n In countries with a developed junior market, there are stock exchanges like the TSX Venture in Canada or the ASX in Australia, and there are investors who accept simple math in advance: nine projects out of ten will fail. That’s why early stage exploration is funded there like a venture – incrementally, with an understanding of the risk, and with an expectation of Xs. A junior acts according to an understandable scenario: test a hypothesis \u2192 show data \u2192 attract the next round. <\/p>\n\n There is almost no such infrastructure in Russia. Formally, there is a segment for juniors on the St. Petersburg Exchange, but there are no real placements of exploration projects there. There is no mass capital market that works specifically with exploration risk. As a result, the junior faces a practical question: if there is no venture capital market, where to go for financing? <\/p>\n\n The most obvious solution is to go to those who really need the new resource: large mining companies<\/a> – so-called strategic investors (“strategists” in industry jargon). It would seem to be an ideal tie-up: a junior quickly tests a hypothesis, brings data, and the strategist gives money and then buys out or takes over the project. <\/p>\n\n I have seen such models from the inside – I have worked in conjunction with large companies and in junior projects. But “logical” doesn’t always mean “works”: then you start to see differences in goals, speed and control – and that’s where cooperation can break down. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n A strategist does not think in terms of hypothesis, but in terms of production. He cares about replenishing the resource base and utilization of the plant. He evaluates the project through the lens of future production, stability and manageability. When a strategist enters an early project, he not only gives money, but also includes corporate procedures, controls and approvals. <\/p>\n\n Tamara Golovina notes that at the early stage, the involvement of a strategist often changes the very nature of the project. Any change in the work program requires approvals, decisions are made within a large structure, and the pace slows down. As a result, the junior loses autonomy and works as a regular contractor. <\/p>\n\n At the same time, a strategic partner may be an ideal option at a later stage – when the hypothesis is confirmed, there are resources and a clear prospect of industrial evaluation. Then it is a logical exit scenario, but at the search stage, the coincidence of logics is rare. <\/p>\n\n If a strategic company is not always suitable, there remains the second type of capital – the financial investor<\/strong>. He is not tied to a particular factory and does not think about capacity utilization. He is interested in something else: the ratio of risk to potential profitability<\/strong>. He looks at the team, the hypothesis, the work program, and asks quite a practical question – how the project will grow in value and where the exit is possible. <\/p>\n\n And here it quickly becomes apparent that the participants in the conversation use different languages<\/strong>. The financial investor thinks in terms of capital return, timing and profitability. The geologist talks about something else: the structure of the section, metal content, geological features and prospects of the object. The geologist shows maps and sections, while the investor tries to figure out how to make money from it<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n Project geologist Arman N. speaks directly about the difference in expectations: many investors want a quick and guaranteed result, sometimes already approved reserves at an early stage. But exploration by its very nature is different: it is a step-by-step and risk-oriented process, where results appear gradually. <\/p>\n\n So the problem is not that geologists are “wrong” and investors are “too demanding”. It’s just that the language of geology and the language of capital have existed separately for a long time<\/strong>. And as long as a project cannot explain its idea in a logic understandable to the investor, the money does not come. <\/p>\n\n It was out of this problem that the idea for the junior gas pedal grew: to teach teams how to translate a geological hypothesis into the language of investment.<\/p>\n If a geologist and an investor speak different languages, an obvious question arises: who should “translate” this conversation? One of the attempts to solve this problem was Russia’s first junior gas pedal.<\/strong><\/a>which was launched by a team of industry experts and investors. Tamara Golovina became its managing partner. <\/p>\n\n The idea behind the gas pedal<\/a> was simple: to prepare early exploration projects to talk to investors. Not to teach them how to speak nicely and not to turn geologists into financiers, but to bring the project to the point where it is possible to discuss money with them at all<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n In essence, the gas pedal works as project structuring. The team must formulate a geological hypothesis, describe the work program, understand the economic logic of the site and explain how the project value will grow in the next stages. <\/p>\n\n Within the program, teams worked with experts and mentors. Projects were analyzed from the point of view of geology, economics, and investment logic: they refined the hypothesis, adjusted the work program, collected data, and prepared a presentation for investors. For many participants, this was the first time when a geological project had to be described not only through maps and sections, but also through costs, risks and development scenarios<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n The most indicative result of the program is the selection funnel<\/strong>. The first stream of the gas pedal received 65 applications. But only 7 teams were allowed to reach the accelerator stage. After working with the projects, the investment committee retained 5. <\/p>\n\n This statistic shows an important thing: the problem arises long before the meeting with the investor. Most projects are not even ready for the stage where they begin to be structured for investment dialog. Somewhere there is not enough team, somewhere a hypothesis has not been formulated, somewhere economics has not been calculated or basic data has not been collected. <\/p>\n\n The finale of the program after three months of work was Demo Day<\/strong><\/a>which took place in January in Moscow. It brought together representatives of major mining companies, investors and industry experts. For the first time, early-stage projects entered a public professional dialog with investors. <\/p>\n\n One of the market participants put it this way: “A normal interface between junior and major has appeared. Projects have begun to speak the same language with investors.<\/em><\/p>\n\n And this is perhaps the main result of the program. Not the success of individual teams, but the emergence of a point of contact between geology and capital<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n At the same time, the gas pedal itself does not solve a systemic problem. Rather, it shows the state of the market. If only a few out of dozens of applications can be prepared for an investment conversation, it means that the gap occurs much earlier – in the culture of project preparation, in the understanding of the economy, in the ability to work with risk. <\/p>\n\n That is why the gas pedal in this story is not so much a financing tool as a diagnosis of the industry<\/strong>. It shows that too few prepared projects reach the investor, which means that the problem of reproducing the mineral resource base starts long before the stage of attracting money. <\/p>\n\n<\/a>Who are the juniors and why are they forced to be tech savvy<\/h2>\n\n
<\/a>Russian reality: license is available, no project is available<\/h2>\n\n
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Mass or quality: what a Russian junior should be like<\/h2>\n\n
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<\/a>Where does a junior get the money<\/h2>\n\n
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Who invests in Russia – strategist or financier<\/h2>\n\n
<\/a>Why the junior gas pedal was created<\/h2>\n\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\nThose who secure the future: why the world needs juniors<\/h2>\n\n