(Bloomberg) -- Sprott Inc.’s former top executive, Peter Grosskopf, has acquired the firm’s Canadian investment banking business in a bid to help mining companies make deals as industry consolidation heats up.

Sprott Capital Partners has become a privately held standalone company after Grosskopf led a management buyout of the Sprott division last month. Terms weren’t disclosed. The new firm, which offers underwriting and advisory services for small mining companies, has been renamed SCP Resource Finance. Grosskopf, Sprott’s chief executive officer from 2010 to 2022, is CEO.

Without Sprott as a parent, the Toronto-based firm can now shed “a complex structure” that made it difficult to run investment banking services, Grosskopf said in a Wednesday interview. “Now we can be independent, conflict-free and we can focus on what will make our business and our clients the most returns.”

Some of the world’s top gold miners are hunting for acquisitions as they wrestle with faltering production at aging mines. Grosskopf said that creates opportunity for exploration firms and small-scale producers.

“When one of them has a good mine, it makes more sense to be owned within a larger portfolio,” he said. “So the buyouts of single-mine companies are going to accelerate.”

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