The way I'd figured it EGR plans to take the graphite feedstock...

The way I'd figured it EGR plans to take the graphite feedstock and put it through the patented purification and shaping processes (presumably in this order). This process generates shperical graphite (60% by volume) and HF free purified waste off-cuts (40% by volume).

Some of this HF purified waste off-cut is then the starting point for the flowsheet noted in the announcement where an "Aqueous Solution with Binders" is combined with a high intensity mixer which after being put through a pelletiser produces pellets. My guess is enough other industries have added a binder to a product and then chucked it into a pelletiser that there is nothing able to be patented in this bit of the process. While possible, its unlikely that a unique formulation binder has been used, and even if it had, other binding formulations are likely to work pretty well. After all the objective is simply to create a product that can be easily fed into a furnace. The technical specifications are in the mineralisation not the physical shape.

That said, the product is not easily to copy because it would appear to start with purified graphite that hasn't used Hydrofluric acid processes. It turns what would have been a waste product into a revenue stream at only a modest additional cost.