DevEx uranium push under new chief: project scale and drilling lens for engineers
Reviewed by Tom Sullivan

First reported on MINING.com
30 Second Briefing
Uranium explorer DevEx Resources has installed former Rio Tinto battery materials chief Marnie Finlayson as managing director and, on her first day, agreed a A$7.5 million deal to acquire Alligator Energy’s Northern Territory uranium portfolio. Together with ground bought from Rio Tinto last month, DevEx now controls a contiguous 9,200km² position in the Alligator Rivers Uranium Province, which has historically yielded more than 700Mlb U₃O₈ at operations such as Ranger and Jabiluka. A A$32 million placement at 14.5c, plus a planned A$3 million SPP, will fund an expanded 2026 drilling campaign on McArthur River Basin and Alligator Rivers targets.
Technical Brief
- Acquisition from Alligator Energy is priced at A$7.5 million for the Northern Territory uranium portfolio.
- New MD Marnie Finlayson brings 27 years at Rio Tinto, including leading its battery materials division.
- Her past project experience includes a three‑year assignment overseeing Rio Tinto’s Jadar lithium development in Serbia.
- DevEx’s McArthur River Basin ground is being targeted as an analogue to Canada’s high‑grade Athabasca Basin.
- Athabasca comparison explicitly references NexGen’s Arrow and Cameco’s Cigar Lake as grade and style benchmarks.
- Capital raising was upsized to A$32 million after strong demand for shares at 14.5c.
- A further A$3 million share purchase plan at the same 14.5c issue price is planned for existing holders.
Our Take
DevEx’s A$32 million raising and A$7.5 million acquisition of Alligator Energy’s Northern Territory uranium portfolio position it at the larger end of early-stage uranium financings in our database, signalling an intent to build a basin-scale footprint rather than a single-asset play in the Alligator Rivers Uranium Province.
The comparison to Canada’s Athabasca Basin and assets like Arrow and Cigar Lake underlines that the McArthur River Basin and Alligator Rivers region in Australia, with some 700 million pounds discovered, is one of the few uranium districts in our coverage with both Tier 1-scale endowment and a long permitting and legacy-mines history that developers must navigate carefully.
With Rio Tinto, Cameco, NexGen Energy and Albemarle all referenced alongside uranium and lithium, DevEx is stepping into commodity spaces where our recent coverage shows majors and large developers increasingly dominate capital allocation, which may give juniors a narrower window to secure strategic partners or offtake by 2026.
Prepared by collating external sources, AI-assisted tools, and Geomechanics.io’s proprietary mining database, then reviewed for technical accuracy & edited by our geotechnical team.
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