David Horgan, a pioneering figure in the Irish mining and exploration industries, has died aged 66.
Over more than three decades, Mr Horgan helped found, finance and run various early-stage exploration businesses focused on different resources. Oil, diamonds, and gold all featured among the commodities targeted by the companies for which he worked throughout his varied career.
Those companies included Clontarf Energy, Petrel Resources and Botswana Diamonds, all of which paid tribute to Mr Horgan on Wednesday.
His work took him to exotic destinations across continents, including Africa and South America, a part of the job in which friends say he revelled.
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Former colleagues, entrepreneurs John Teeling and Jim Finn, noted that after 10 days in a new country, “he could converse with locals in their own language and actively participate in local culture and traditions”.
“He was fearless, travelling in dangerous territories, traipsing across swamps or exploring long-abandoned mines. He spoke eight languages,” they said.
His reputation extended beyond his industry, as the media frequently sought his views when energy prices were volatile.
Born in Belfast, Mr Horgan attended national school in Dublin, but continued his education in British Columbia, Canada. He earned a first-class honours law degree from Cambridge in England, then obtained a Master of Business Administration from Harvard Business School in the US.
He began his career with Boston Consulting Group. In 1991, he returned to the Republic to pursue his interests in natural resources.
After a brief stint with bloodstock auctioneer Goffs in 1991, he moved to Kenmare Resources, the titanium miner, where he was commercial director.
In 1992, he joined Mr Teeling and Mr Finn and their early-stage resource companies based in Clontarf, Dublin. He worked closely with both in the years that followed. They described his passing as a profound personal loss in a joint statement.
“In over three decades together, we have created, financed, managed and listed a series of early-stage exploration ventures in a variety of natural resources,” they said.
“Our small group had some successes operating gold mines in Zimbabwe, selling off oil licences in Peru and discovering a diamond mine in Botswana.”
Mr Horgan responded to fading investor interest in the industry with a simple message: no exploration, no mines, no transition to green energy.
“His passing, just as the message seems to be gaining traction, is ironic,” said Mr Teeling and Mr Finn. “He is a huge loss for his friends, family, colleagues, shareholders and the wider Irish resource sector.”
