David Heydon

David Heydon, is recognized as the pioneer of the modern deep sea mining industry. He was the Founder and until 2008 CEO of seafloor minerals company Nautilus Minerals Inc., which was the world's leading deep sea minerals company; developing the world's first hard rock copper-gold mine in 1,700 metres of water.

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Along with American Metal's CEO, he founded DeepGreen Resources Inc. in 2011, a world leader in the deep sea mineral industry, and which became TMC The Metals Company when it listed on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange in 2021.

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He attracted investments from senior miners such as Placer Dome (now Barrick Gold), Teck Resources and Anglo American while at Nautilus. Since taking Nautilus public in May 2006, Mr Heydon raised US $334 million in cash for the Company to fund development of seafloor polymetallic sulphides.

Mr Heydon was the recipient of the Moore Medal for contribution to science and man’s knowledge of marine minerals and its environs. Since retiring as CEO of DeepGreen Resources (now The Metals Company), David has continued his passion for the Oceans with a focus over the last 8 years on the polar regions of the Arctic and Antarctica taking both scientists and passengers to view the changes in these areas over recent years. In 2024 at his initiation, he along with 20 international scientists visited the North Pole of Inaccessibility. Being the first people ever to reach this pole of inaccessibility they gathered valuable data from this remote polar transect - creating data points of the Arctic never before accessed.