International Battery Metals Ltd.

Thank you for standing by. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the IBAT First Quarter Fiscal Year 2027 Earnings Conference Call and Webcast. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to turn the conference over to Brian Siegel, Investor Relations. The floor is yours.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to our first quarter fiscal 2027 financial results conference call. I'm Brian Siegel of Hayden IR. With me today is our interim CEO, Garrett Galloway, who will provide a business update, and our CFO, Michael Rutledge, who will review our financial performance. Before we begin, I want to remind everyone that except for historical information, the matters discussed in this presentation are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Words like believe, expect, and anticipate refer to our best estimates as of this call, and there can be no assurances that these will actually take place. So our actual future results could differ significantly from these statements. Further information on the company's risk factors It's contained in the company's quarterly and annual reports filed on CDAR Plus and with the Securities and Exchange Commission on AdGear. Now I'll turn the call over to Garrett.

Thanks, Brian, and good morning. I want to start by addressing Joe Mills' recent resignation. His departure was not a result of any issues with the company, a strategic shift, or a change in any of the opportunities we have spoken about during prior calls. Joe came to IBAT to study the company and get it ready for its next chapter. And that is what he did. He brought stability to the business and we have enhanced the team with a focus on execution. Importantly, the team has completed numerous successful testing programs that prove our technology performance across a variety of brines from different regions. We also have a clear understanding of our flow sheet and where IBAT fits into the field development process and the partnerships required to construct a full operation. And finally, we have identified key counterparties who would be suitable partners for IBAS DLE technology. I am grateful to Joe and for his guidance over the past several months. He leaves the company in a stronger place than when he started. Looking forward, I can tell you the direction holds because I've been part of it since early 2025. Over that period, the macro environment has improved and engagement has accelerated. I've been the one leading our conversations with counterparties So these are not new relationships that I'm picking up cold. The people who did the technical and operational work that got us here are the same people doing it today. The team that built this is still here, and the strategy we set over the past several quarters is the playbook we are still running. Let me give you an update on the opportunities themselves. Here in North America, we are in early conversations with resource owners where it is too soon to speculate on if or when they move forward with a project or daily implementations. Something that has come up repeatedly in these conversations is that our technology is designed, sourced, and built entirely in the United States. For a domestic resource owner deciding who to partner with, that is a real advantage. Specifically, in the smack over, we are still actively pursuing field deployments with certain counterparties who have drilled wells, completed their subsurface diligence, and are ready to evaluate DLA. In the Middle East, we continue to pursue an opportunity with our partners. Based on where this process stands, it looks like that decision could come over the next several quarters, which could be impacted by ongoing issues in the Middle East. We're optimistic about lithium developments in the Middle East and plan to keep investors updated on any material IVAT developments. In South America, there continues to be an uptick in resource evaluation and potential investment decisions. Our partner is encouraged by current activity and we continue to support them in those efforts. Overall, Resource owners are finally advancing projects and the opportunity for iBuyDLE deployments is wider today than it ever has been in the past. The backdrop is moving our way too. The lithium demand curve continues to gain support with demand expected to increase from 1.6 million tons per year in 2025 to 4 to 6 million tons per year by 2035. Prices have remained supportive and resource evaluations, which went quiet during the downturn, are reactivating and evaluating development. Importantly, many of these new projects are taking a harder look at DLE as the optimal solution to advance development. That said, most resource owners are still not ready to move forward with commercial projects or fully deploy DLE at this stage, but IBAT is ready to help them advance towards a decision. I'll end where I started. The transition does not change what we are doing or how we are doing it. We will stay disciplined and sign the right deal on the right terms. And then we will put this technology in the field. Signing deals to become a daily technology provider on a resource is our top priority day in and day out. This will eventually advance our path to revenue. I've been a part of the company's plan for this integral period, and I am confident in where we are headed. With that, I'll turn it over to Michael to walk through the numbers. Thanks, Gary.

And lest I note otherwise, all comparisons are for the first quarter of fiscal 2027 against the same quarter last year. We remain early in our revenue development. This quarter, we recognized 120,000 of service revenue from brine testing, up from 7,000 a year ago. Operating costs, excluding depreciation, decreased to 400,000 this quarter from 600,000 in the same quarter a year ago, while SG&A decreased to 1.8 million this quarter from 2.3 million last year. Our operating loss narrowed to 2.9 million from 3.6 million an improvement of roughly $700,000 as we ran the business leaner and certain costs from last year did not repeat. Each quarter, we record a non-cash change in our warrant liability based on updated pricing model calculations. This quarter, we experienced a gain of $2.9 million compared to a gain of $5.3 million a year ago. These fluctuations will continue until the outstanding warrants are exercised or expire. The net result was a loss of $28,000 or zero cents per share compared to a net income of $1.7 million or a penny per share last year. That change is primarily the result of the smaller non-cash warrant gain offset by lower operating and G&A costs in the current year. We ended the quarter with $9.4 million in cash compared to $9.2 million at the end of March, and we carried no debt. During the quarter, we closed a private placement with EV Metals, an insider of the company, issuing approximately 34.3 million units at $0.08 per share for gross proceeds of $2.8 million, which brought cumulative funding under our existing letter of intent to $15 million. With the cash on hand at quarter end, we believe we have sufficient operating cash to continue through at least the next 12 months, and we have a strong balance sheet to fund our ongoing operations. When we sign a deal, we expect we will need to raise additional capital as equity or debt to upgrade the plant and support deployment and potentially build one or two small pilot plants. With that, I'll hand it back to Garrett. Thanks, Michael.

I'll end by reiterating where we stand. The strategy hasn't changed. The team that built this is still here, and the market is gaining momentum. Our job is to convert opportunities into one or more projects in the field, and that is exactly where our focus is. I appreciate you being on this call this morning, and we look forward to updating you as we go. Operator, we can turn it over to questions.

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star then the number one on your telephone keypad to raise your hand and join the queue. If you would like to withdraw your question, simply press star one again. Once again, to ask a question at this time, press star then the number one on your telephone keypad. That concludes our telephonic Q&A session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Brian Siegel for any closing remarks.

Thanks. We've got a few write-in questions. Related to the pending deals, has Joseph Archer had any negative implication related to getting these deals done? Has any partner expressed any concerns related to continuity and the ability to deliver?

No, as we discussed during the prepared remarks, the team remains in place to execute on these deals and any conversations that were taking place while Joe was here are still consistent with the expectations that we had. Okay, and then

Do you think that you are going to be, sorry, are you being considered for the permanent CEO role or as the board started to search for a permanent replacement?

We'll update the investors in the market at the time when the time is correct. We are currently focused on execution and evaluating opportunities with counterparties, and we'll update everybody as developments happen.

Okay.

That's all we have from the writings. We can close it out now.

That concludes the Q&A session and our webcast. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect and have a wonderful rest of your day.