When they construct the Demonstration Plant they have said it will be commercial for the higher value minerals and they expect revenue from Gallium Q42025 (*1). To expand past 1 TPD they just add extra modules.
The Jan 29 announcement said the first plant is planned for Houston. Now by saying the First Plant, to me insinuates there will be more than one Plant. Previously they’ve just referred to the Demo Plant (singular). They said to build it they’ve budgeted on $3m (assume USD? though it was said in an Australian audience Webinar so maybe AUD?).
They are also applying for various Govt grants such as the DoE for $3-10m (*2) supported by Indium corp. I’d suggest if granted the purpose of the grant will be the manufacture of critical metals Indium Corp handle, namely Gallium, Germanium & Indium. Most of these grants seem to require the company to contribute about half. So a min $3m grant after we put in 50% could finance 2 Plants or more if the cost of the plant is A$3m (not USD) - we are also well funded.
The 2nd Plant could possibly be dedicated to rare earths. We have been collaborating with a REE company for some time but are under a NDA. Good chance that’s Lynas who have also been awarded very generous grants. In the Lynas case they were awarded US$30m in Feb 2021, another $120m to build the HREE plant in Texas 2022, which was increased to $258m in 2023.
MTM has said they are in discussions with 3 companies that are part of the Grant program that have asked to “bolt on” our technology (*1)Indium Corp + Lynas would account for 2.
Now we have the technology to produce the whole US annual consumption of Gallium with 4-5 modular demo plants which we could manufacture within a year with the right funding. I doubt Trump is worried about the green-ness of our technology however our cost of recovering REEs and speed of build is far superior to Lynas’ old technology. The Geological Survey (USGS) report found that a complete ban by China on these critical metals could reduce gallium availability by 40%, increase prices by 250%, and even hit US GDP by 0.42% (*6). I think we’ve got a very good chance of getting a grant especially considering there are no mines that produce Gallium as a bi-product in the US, the US imports all it’s Gallium & Indium corp is the only company that presently processes Gallium in the US.
The 3rd IMO most likely will be recovering precious metals from e-waste, Michael has talked of collaborations with waste companies previously. He has mentioned several times there are Several big players bubbling in the background, that’s who we are doing the testing for (*5)
Once the Demo plant design is finalised we will order the long lead items & start construction. If we receive Govt grants I think they’ll start construction on Demo Plant #2 even before #1 is finished. By then the engineering would have advanced even further derisking the project. IMO the 1st plant will be committed to Indium Corp so they’ll need more Demo Plants for Rare Earths and for production of e-waste as well as demonstrating how it works for Black mass and Red mud etc. It is after all a “Demonstration” plant, however we want to earn money from it producing high value metals such as Gallium this year.
*1Crux interview
*2December Quarterly released 31/1/25
*3Peloton Research report Jan25
*5 Stocks Downunder interview Dec’24 after CR
*6 Pitt st Research Rep Dec’24
(20min delay)