He may soon be a director on the board of emerging coal explorer Blackwood Corporation after the company raised $28.4 million through a share placement with Mulsanne Resources, a company associated with the Tinkler Group.

Blackwood said Mulsanne Resources agreed to subscribe 95 million shares at 30c per share, representing a 50% premium to the five-day volume weighted average price of 20c per share.

Following the completion of the transaction, Blackwood’s major shareholders will include both the Tinkler and Noble group, each taking a 33.85% of the issued capital of the company.

In addition, the Tinkler Group will nominate two directors to the Blackwood board, being Tinkler and his associate Chris Lauritzen.

Blackwood chairman Barry Bolitho said the Tinkler Group’s investment in Blackwood was a major boost for the company.

“The Tinkler Group is well known for its entrepreneurial skills and has a significant record of successful investment in both new and established coal projects and companies,” he said.

“This investment at a substantial market premium shows great confidence in our portfolio of coal exploration tenements across the proven coal basins of Queensland and the company’s ability to exploit them.”

Blackwood chief executive officer Todd Harrington said the funding would enable the company to advance the planned exploration program at its tenements.

“This transaction will ensure that we have a well-funded pathway of exploration and resource delineation which also improves our early claim on rail and port access”, Harrington said.

“Blackwood has an aggressive exploration program aimed at delineating a JORC resource at our priority exploration sites at the South Pentland and Taroom projects by the end of this year.”

The funding will also be used to kick-start exploration at Blackwood’s Bowen Basin tenements.

Blackwood, which holds a number of coal exploration permits in Queensland, has a total JORC exploration target of 3.29-4.74 billion tonnes.

Its Taroom project is located to the north of Xstrata Coal’s Wandoan project at the northeastern edge of the Surat Basin.

The Taroom project comprises five tenures covering 189 sub blocks of 639sq.km.

Blackwood is planning to start a phase 2 drilling program at Taroom sometime in the second quarter of 2012.