01 / Originate
Understand what project generators do.
Project generators and prospect generators identify and package exploration opportunities, then seek partners or buyers to help advance them.
Three ideas in plain language
- Prospect generation: finding early exploration targets and assembling evidence to test them.
- Project generation: developing exploration opportunities, including rights and geological information, that partners or buyers can assess.
- Company generation: bringing projects, people and funding together in a dedicated business. Here this describes an approach, not a universal industry category.
Two labels, overlapping practice
“Prospect generator” often emphasises finding early targets. “Project generator” can describe a broader range of assets and stages. Usage overlaps: the label alone does not tell you how a company works or what it owns.
Read the actual activities, portfolio and agreements. Some generators also fund drilling themselves, operate projects, acquire royalties or invest in other companies.
Established examples in Canada
Canada has established examples of the prospect and project generator model, including Altius and Eagle Plains. These businesses develop exploration opportunities and seek partners, retaining interests such as equity or royalties. For Australian readers exploring Canadian-listed miners, Beyond ASX’s guide to TSXV, CSE and OTC markets provides useful background.
What gets generated?
- A geological idea. Reinterpret regional data, previous exploration and mineral systems.
- An assessable opportunity. Secure appropriate tenure (rights to explore or hold ground) or contractual rights; check access, competing claims and obligations.
- A testable target. Use proportionate fieldwork, sampling and geophysics to define the next question.
- A partnership proposition. Provide evidence and agree who will fund and operate the next stage.
Why bring in a partner?
Drilling and follow-up programmes can require substantially more capital than initial targeting. A partner may fund this work in return for rights or ownership, allowing the generator to work on other opportunities.
That exchanges some potential upside and control for outside funding. Partner-funded exploration is not free capital: the partner receives negotiated consideration.
Discipline still matters
Watch overhead, ongoing tenure costs, management incentives and the issuance of new shares. Outside funding at the project level does not eliminate dilution at the generator-company level.
See how a project becomes a company