A Canadian group has teamed up with a major research and development institute in Ukraine to market technology and advanced materials, including an aluminum-scandium alloy designed for the aerospace industry.
Emtech Technology, a new company to be formed by the amalgamation of Cabot Resources (VSE), Quinterra Resources TSE) and the Emtech Group, expects to begin trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange by the end of July and generate $25 million in revenues over the next 12 months.
J.J. Elken, former chairman and chief executive officer of TVX Mining (now TVX Gold), was recently appointed chairman and CEO of Emtech. The junior’s board of directors will include such illustrious names as: Philip Lapp, vice-chairman of SPAR Aerospace; Eike Batista, chairman of TVX; and Ian Rugeroni, president of Alcan Enterprises, the aluminum fabricating division of Alcan Aluminum.
The I.N. Frantsevich Institute for Problems of Materials Science (IPMS) in Kiev, Emtech’s joint-venture partner, was founded in 1955 and has been a major source of advanced materials for military and space programs in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
As one of several joint-venture projects, Emtech will mine scandium, a rare earth metal, from an underground deposit in central Ukraine. According to Kilborn Inc., the deposit — which occurs as a discrete orebody within an operating iron mine — contains 7.3 million tonnes grading 105 grams scandium per tonne.
Scandium, which is almost exclusively produced as a byproduct of uranium operations, sells at three to eight times the price of gold. But there’s a catch. Although an aluminum-scandium alloy developed by IPMS was used in the Soviet military aircraft and aerospace industries for years, the alloy has never been tested in the West. Emtech’s mine is the only documented primary scandium deposit in the world.
Emtech’s challenge will be to market the alloy, attractive because of its high strength-to-weight ratio, to suppliers of the aerospace and automobile industries. President Benton Wilcoxon said seven companies around the world are evaluating the product.
“Preliminary indicators have been very good,” he told the Bay Street crowd at a meeting.
In an interview after the meeting, Vice-President of Resources William Burton said Emtech aims to increase annual scandium production at the mine to 13 tonnes (416,000 oz.) from two, within the next 24 months.
Burton says Emtech is ensuring that it will not be held responsible for previous environmental problems at the mine.
The joint venture consists of Emtech subsidiary Ashurst Technology (43%), Ukraine-based VostGOK (54%) and IPMS (3%).
Be the first to comment on "Emtech and Ukrainians to market scandium"