IN Brief:
- The Department of War will invest $450 million in Elmet through redeemable preferred equity under the IBAS programme.
- More than $165 million is planned for US manufacturing sites, with around $150 million directed towards Nevada tungsten-processing capacity.
- A separate DLA agreement carries a ceiling of up to $2 billion for tungsten material supplied to the National Defense Stockpile.
The US Department of War is committing $450 million to The Elmet Group to expand tungsten mining, processing, and manufacturing capacity, combining government equity with domestic factory investment and allied sourcing for a metal used across more than 100 US defence programmes.
The investment will be made through redeemable preferred equity under the Industrial Base Analysis and Sustainment programme, with an initial $200 million drawdown planned at closing and further funding to follow. The Department will also receive warrants representing up to 19.9% of Elmet’s common stock on a post-transaction basis, together with rights to appoint an independent director and a non-voting board observer.
Elmet plans to direct more than $165 million into manufacturing operations in Lewiston, Maine, Coldwater, Michigan, and Euclid, Ohio. The programme is intended to increase production and modernise infrastructure supplying defence, aerospace, semiconductor, medical, energy, and other industrial customers.
A further approximately $150 million is expected to support the Springer Tungsten Complex at Imlay in Nevada, where Elmet plans to form and operate a majority-owned joint venture with Blue Moon Metals and Australia’s EQ Resources. The project is intended to restart and expand ammonium paratungstate conversion capacity, adding a processing stage identified by the US government as a significant constraint within the domestic tungsten supply chain.
Elmet will also establish a Refining & Trading division to coordinate sourcing, processing, and delivery across an expanded network incorporating operations and partnerships in the US, Australia, and Spain. The objective is to create a more vertically integrated route from mined material through refining and manufacturing rather than relying on supply chains whose important intermediate stages remain concentrated overseas.
Tungsten’s defence value comes from its combination of density, hardness, temperature resistance, and wear performance. Those properties support applications across missiles, munitions, aerospace propulsion, naval and undersea systems, electronics, and specialist industrial equipment.
Processing capacity is consequently as important as access to ore. A mine produces feedstock, but defence programmes require refined materials, powders, alloys, formed products, and finished components that have passed the necessary manufacturing and quality controls.
The Department says Elmet is the only US-owned, fully integrated producer of tungsten and molybdenum materials and components and supports more than 100 defence programmes. These include F-35, Patriot PAC-3, Trident D5, Next Generation Interceptor, Precision Strike Missile, and Virginia- and Columbia-class submarine activity.
The investment therefore supports a supplier already embedded across major weapons and platform programmes rather than creating a new critical-minerals business from scratch. Increasing capacity at an existing qualified manufacturer can shorten some of the industrial lead time, although mines, chemical processing, furnaces, forming equipment, machining, and downstream customer qualification still expand on different schedules.
Washington also expects the investment to establish the only independent ammonium paratungstate facility in North America. APT sits between mined concentrates and later tungsten products, making conversion capacity a strategic point in the chain that cannot be replaced simply by purchasing more ore.
The US government places that exposure within a global market where China accounts for an estimated 85% of tungsten supply and around 40% of molybdenum. The Elmet plan therefore extends beyond domestic extraction, combining Australian and Spanish upstream sources with Nevada processing and established US manufacturing sites.
The latest investment follows Elmet’s move to broaden its manufacturing footprint in Europe through the planned acquisition of ams OSRAM’s refractory-metals operation in Schwabmünchen. That transaction adds an established German tungsten and molybdenum manufacturing base, while the US programme is focused more directly on domestic processing capacity and supply security.
Investment is also appearing further downstream. CPS Technologies recently secured its first defence order for QuickSet tungsten-alloy components, illustrating how mineral availability eventually has to be converted into finished products with controlled geometry, material properties, and inspection.
Elmet’s programme also extends into strategic reserves. Its Elmet Technologies subsidiary has received a separate Defense Logistics Agency indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity agreement supporting the US National Defense Stockpile, with a ceiling value of up to $2 billion and a guaranteed funded commitment of $150 million.
The agreement covers tungsten ores, concentrates, and sodium tungstate. Deliveries are intended to begin as additional supply becomes available from newly supported mines, processing operations, and offtake arrangements rather than immediately drawing material away from existing industrial customers.
That sequencing is intended to prevent stockpile purchasing from tightening the same domestic market the wider investment is supposed to strengthen. Building government inventory without increasing upstream and processing capacity could otherwise redirect scarce material rather than improve overall supply resilience.
The base ordering period runs to August 2031, with an option extending the framework to August 2033. Such timescales reflect the physical lead time involved in mining, conversion, furnace capacity, powder processing, forming, machining, and customer qualification.
The Department expects the wider programme to create jobs in Michigan and Maine, preserve manufacturing employment in Ohio, stimulate mining activity in Nevada, and support around 1,200 downstream roles across manufacturing, engineering, and logistics. The industrial outcome will depend on whether the capital removes actual processing and manufacturing constraints rather than simply increasing nominal investment in critical minerals.
The $450 million commitment represents unusually direct government involvement in a materials company, but its structure reflects the strategic value now being assigned to intermediate processing. Tungsten cannot support missiles, submarines, aircraft, or electronics while it remains an ore concentrate; the useful capacity lies in the chain able to refine it, convert it, manufacture it, and deliver qualified material repeatedly to defence programmes.
