Speaking to reporters after announcing a record half year profit of $402.7 million, Morgan said Corridor "possibly has the world's largest and best resource of titanium-based material".

The project slots neatly into WMC's requirements for "best ore resources, best [market] position, large, low cost, and long life", he said.

"It [mineral sands] is a business that has been shown to be significantly profitable for the major participants in it," he said.

"We have looked at the area for quite some time, and in different continents than the one we've ended up in. And there is I guess a coincidence of timing that at Musgrave [nickel prospect in Western Australia] there is a titanium resource as well. How valuable that is, is a moot point. The concentration right now is on the Corridor Sands project, over which we have an option."

WMC expects to complete its due diligence on Corridor Sands by the end of October, when it will decide whether to exercise an option to earn a majority interest and secure management control.

Despite Morgan's enthusiasm, WMC's involvement in the project has raised eyebrows, mainly because of the sovereign risks of operating in Africa.

It was only six months ago that WMC decided to lop three advanced exploration projects in other high-risk locations -- Cuba (nickel), Uzbekistan (gold) and the Philippines (copper/gold).

WMC spent nearly $90 million exploring those three projects, only to decide they were dogs, too risky, or both.

Now there are fears that the company will blow more of its shareholders' funds in another "highly encouraging" deposit in a far-flung land.

Mozambique, with a population of around 16 million people and Portuguese as the official language, is considered to be an "increasingly attractive investment destination", according to WMC.

Maybe. But, the crunch will come when WMC has to start pumping serious money into a continent that is regarded by insurers as one of the riskiest on the planet.

And it is not just the location that has some analysts jumpy.

Given the importance of marketing and process technology in mineral sands, they argue it makes more sense for WMC to buy an existing producer -- perhaps Iluka or Ticor -- rather than trying to build one from scratch.

After all, look what happened to BHP at the ill-fated Beenup project in Western Australia.

However, with mineral sands prices on the rise -- and the lure of major profit margins down the track -- WMC has thrown caution to the wind.

As far as West Musgrave goes, analysts so far are not getting too excited about the prospect's titanium potential.

Rather, they are highly encouraged by its future impact on the nickel division.

"West Musgrave is already being pencilled into WMC's nickel development strategy, providing up to half of a plus-30,000 tonnes per annum nickel division within the next decade," said CIBC analyst John Macdonald in a research note.

"Expect WMC to display increasing confidence and supportive technical information about Olympic Dam [coper-uranium mine in South Australia] and West Musgrave over the next 12 months," he said.