Corporate

Anastasios (Tom) Drivas

CEO, Director

Tom Drivas is a business entrepreneur with over 30 years of experience in various industries, including over 20 years in the mineral resource industry and is also currently a Director of Romios Gold Resources Inc., a publicly traded company he founded in 1995.

Stephen Burega

President

The newest member of the Appia team, Stephen took over as President in January 2023. Stephen brings 16 years of management and operations experience in the mining and natural resources sectors including corporate development and fundraising; joint venture due diligence, structure and negotiations; and management of public markets. His deep emerging markets background along with a strong understanding of stakeholder management, social development and structured community engagement and programming also positions him well to lead Appia’s First Nations community engagements. His additional 8 years of corporate communications and media relations coupled with extensive issues management and government relations experience are important assets to be leveraged as Appia builds towards the future.

Stephen is also President and CEO of Romios Gold Resources which focussed on base and precious metal exploration in North America. 
 

Dr. Irvine R. Annesley Ph.D., P.Geo.

VP Exploration

Dr. Annesley (Ph.D., P.Geo.) is Professor in Economic (Mining and Mineral Exploration) Geology at École Nationale Supérieure de Géologie, (Nancy, France), and Adjunct Professor in Geology at the University of Saskatchewan, (Saskatoon, Canada). He has over 35 years of global exploration and applied research experience in uranium, gold, and base metals, most recently with Athabasca uranium explorer JNR Resources Inc.

Don Hains P. Geo

President of Hains Engineering Company Limited. He is an industrial minerals exploration and economic geologist and marketing specialist with more than 40 years of experience in development, use and analysis of industrial minerals properties and materials.Mr. Hains is an expert in the analysis of the geology, processing and markets for industrial minerals and the economics of production for industrial minerals. His experience encompasses most of the industrial minerals and specialty metals, including rare earths, lithium, tantalum, niobium, gallium, germanium, graphite, heavy minerals. Assignments have ranged from grass roots exploration to feasibility and market studies and valuation reports. He has conducted studies on a wide range of industrial minerals projects in Canada, the United States, Europe, Africa, and Asia. He is very familiar with trends in end use technologies for most major industrial minerals and specialty minerals, and in process technologies for beneficiation of industrial minerals and specialty metals. He is a Registered Professional Geoscientist (Registration Number 0494) in Ontario and a Professional Member of the Society of Mining, Metallurgy and Exploration (#4175075). He is a graduate of Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario (1974) and Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia (1976). Don is a frequent speaker at major industrial conferences, having presented papers on anorthosite, titanium mineral processing, lithium, and several other commodities.

Antonio Vitor

Country Manager, Brazil

Antonio is a senior executive holding a degree in Administration from Unyahna in 2004. He furthered his education by successfully completing an MBA in 2021 and maintains an active membership with IBGC (Brazilian Institute of Corporate Governance). Antonio possesses specialized expertise in compliance certification pertaining to financing, earning his certification from LEC in 2021.

With a versatile background, Antonio Vitor has a track record as a portfolio manager and valued board member. His professional journey encompasses significant positions, notably as a Territory Manager at Shell, as well as Senior Project Planning and Consulting roles at PwC and Petrobras.