There have been years of rumours of a deal, but the presence of Chinalco as a Rio shareholder (with 14.5%) and partner in that consortium seems to have prevented any substantive Chinese interest. SMB Winning Consortium is reportedly already started work on the 650-km railway linking Simandou to the port. According to analysts, Guinea's decision to suspend all activities at Simandou reflects mostly the "power struggle" between the SMB consortium and Guinean authorities regarding recommendations they made in December in relation to the rail and port infrastructure. There's a third rival in Guinea that the order seems to have ignored. High Power Exploration (HPX), a Canadian mining company controlled by billionaire Robert Friedland (who started the huge Oyu Tolgoi mine in Mongolia that Rio and the Mongolian government now control – Rio through a controlling stake in a company called Turquoise Hill). HPX has similar transport issues which it thinks it can solve by shipping its ore via a railway in Liberia.