Boliden AB is a Swedish multinational metals, mining, and smelting company headquartered in Stockholm. The company produces zinc, copper, lead, nickel, silver, and gold, with operations in Sweden, Finland, Norway, Portugal, and Ireland. The company name comes from the Boliden mine, 30 km northwest of the Swedish town of Skellefteå, where gold was found in 1924. It was once Europe's largest and richest gold mine, but has since 1967 been defunct. The goods produced are sold both to the group's own smelters and to external customers. Boliden owns and operates Europe's biggest zinc mine at Tara in Ireland, but production began there in 1977, since when over 60 million tonnes of ore have been mined. Boliden also owns Garpenberg, which is Sweden's oldest mine still in operation. Mining at Garpenberg, or extracting metals from the ground, began as early as 375 bc. The mineral-rich Skellefte field lies within the Boliden Area, where almost 30 mines have been opened since production began in the 1920s and where Boliden currently operates the Renström and Kristineberg underground mines and the Maurliden open pit mine. Wikipedia