Another key player in beryllium is Japan's NGK Insulators, Ltd. (NGK) (Bloomberg Ticker - NGKIF:US), through its subsidiary NGK Metals Corporation. However, for NGK, its business activities (in electronics) that involve beryllium are in just one of three business segments, the others being ceramics and power.

Then there is UMP, owned by Kazakhstan's nuclear agency Kazatomprom, a major processor and producer of beryllium products, from the pure metal, through aluminum and copper-beryllium alloys, to beryllium oxide base ceramics. While for UMP, beryllium is just one of the metals it processes, and out of which it makes products, in the global beryllium market, the company is a very important supplier of the metal in all its forms: vide the fact that for BEM, UMP is an extremely important supplier and one with whom the company is, reportedly, still in somewhat difficult negotiations over the terms of its purchase commitments.

Finally, in addition to a handful of smaller Chinese players, there is the relative newcomer to the field, the Canadian company, International Beryllium Corporation (IBC) (Bloomberg Ticker - IB:CN), based in Vancouver.

Although still in the early stages, IBC has aspirations to become a global, vertically integrated beryllium company "...focused on every element of the mine to market value chain." It believes, in its words, that "...its consolidation strategy will allow it to form the next global beryllium giant." However, although it doesn't have, at present, the processing piece, it does have very good relations with UMP, which helps fill that gap.

In addition to the two businesses it has recently acquired, Freedom Alloys and Nonferrous Products, the company also has some interesting mineral holdings not only in the U.S. (Colorado and Utah), but also in both Brazil and Uganda.

However, perhaps two of the most interesting aspects of IBC are the following.

First, being new in beryllium, the company has none of the legacy health issues with which other operators have to deal. (While the metal and its alloys are not toxic in solid form, if beryllium enters the body by way of fumes, dust or soluble compounds, it can be extremely toxic, causing, for instance, chronic beryllium disease [CBD]). IBC is, as it were, clean in this area.

Second, the company is engaged in an interesting initiative in the field of uranium/beryllium-based nuclear fuels that it is working on together with Purdue University's Department of Nuclear Engineering. In a recent conversation with him, Anthony Dutton, IBC's CEO, was particularly sanguine about the company's progress, saying: "We are more excited than we originally were, as Purdue's research is more advanced than we had originally appreciated."

Vis-à-vis its competition, not only is this a market in which BEM does not have very significant involvement, but also, as a market, nuclear power generation as a whole is increasingly becoming a focus of attention.

Conclusion

Essentially only four key players dominate the market: Brush Engineered Materials (through subsidiaries), NGK Insulators (through NGK Metals Corporation), International Beryllium Corporation and Ulba Metallurgical Plant. While the first three companies are all quoted, beryllium is a pure-play only for IBC; both the first two companies having significant interests in other markets. And UMP, of course, is practically wholly owned by Kazatomprom.

While, in general, the overall prospects for beryllium appear encouraging, in the current financial circumstances, with the automobile industry (particularly in the U.S.) and the electronics industries (e.g., cell phone, personal computer and handheld electronic devices) both facing uncertain times, growth, if any, in these sectors of the market may be difficult.

On the other hand, if the nuclear power generation industry continues to garner interest, then any improvement in fuel efficiency through the use of beryllium will only be good news for those involved in the metal - both for those with significant beryllium mineral holdings and, of course, to whomever owns the IP to that fuel technology.

Afterwords

Make no mistake, there is enough beryllium about; the problem is both finding it in concentrations that are economically viable to exploit, and the cost and difficulty of processing the stuff.

In addition to beryllium in the stockpiles of both the U.S. and UMP, China is understood to have been, and be, a significant producer of beryl. How much of the stuff it has stockpiled is anybody's guess.

Reverting to a subject I have touched upon in previous pieces on the strategic metals, in its continuing review of the country's strategic defense stockpile (including a case study dealing specifically with beryllium), the current U.S. administration is focusing not only on its levels of sales from the stockpile (beryllium copper master alloy has, currently, been "sold out"), but on the whole issue of securing supplies of strategic materials, of which beryllium is one. Indeed, in the case of beryllium, one of the studies prepared for the government states "...foreign suppliers are not considered reliable."

Insofar as sales from the stockpile have been integral to meeting continuing demand for the metal, any change in government policy will certainly have an effect on the industry.

Substitutes: It is currently unclear (publicly, anyway) whether any of the research undertaken into substitutability by the U.S. Army, Navy and Missile Defense Agency has borne fruit. In some nondefense applications, there is a degree of substitutability, but in many instances this leads only to drastically reduced performance. In general, because of its cost, beryllium is already only really employed when its properties are deemed crucial.

Resources

Minor Metals Trade Association (MMTA)

Roskill Information Services

U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)