Case Study

Ford’s 2025 Explorer production halt exposed how rare earth magnets, dysprosium, and terbium can turn a minerals constraint into an automotive shutdown.

Albemarle’s Kemerton shutdown shows why Western lithium hydroxide refining remains structurally exposed to Chinese cost, scale, and demand advantages.

GaN vs SiC, decoded: SiC wins above 650V on thermal headroom, GaN wins on switching speed below it, while gallium supply tilts the long-term risk.

A few percent of dysprosium and terbium keep NdFeB magnets from losing half their coercivity at 150 °C — and sit at the supply chain’s weakest point.

Gallium is 90%+ Chinese and SiC boules grow one slow wafer at a time: here is where the wide-bandgap chip supply chain actually breaks, mine to module.

Bench yields above 90% for gallium, germanium and rare earths fall to 70-80% at pilot scale. Impurities and solvent extraction, not geology, set the limit.

Lynas and MP Materials anchor 25-33% of non-Chinese rare earth supply in 2026, but a 10,000-tonne NdPr deficit keeps the whole system dangerously brittle.

Battery recycling capacity grew ~50% in 2023, but lithium recovery stalls at 40-60% and scrap lags. Mining stays dominant for strategic metals to 2030.