Highlights

• Startups like Enedym and Conifer are developing magnet-free motor technologies validated by major automakers, but scaling to mass production remains 3-6 years away as OEMs demand long-term reliability data.
• BMW, Renault, and Nissan are already shipping rare-earth-free motors in production vehicles, yet 95% of all EV traction motors in 2025 still rely on NdFeB permanent magnets.
• S&P Global forecasts magnet-free motors will triple their market share by 2037 but remain a minority—representing a sector reshaping, not yet rewriting, the rare-earth demand curve.

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A quiet but profound shift is unfolding inside the world’s motor rooms. Across Silicon Valley lofts, Canadian research hubs, and European engineering centers, a new generation of designers is attempting what once felt impossible: building powerful electric motors without rare-earth magnets. This sector is no longer fueled by wishful thinking—it is gaining real technical momentum. But it is still years away from dethroning the NdFeB dynasty. This is change in motion, not yet ignition. And Rare Earth Exchanges™ will be studying every turn of this fast-evolving frontier.

Startups such as California’s Conifer (opens in a new tab) and Canada’s Enedym (opens in a new tab) (just interviewed by Rare Earth Exchanges (opens in a new tab)) are staking bold claims on a magnet-free future. Their ambitions echo the 2025 Machines (opens in a new tab) review, which confirms the engineering foundations are real: induction motors, synchronous reluctance motors, switched-reluctance machines (SRMs), wound-field synchronous motors, and modern ferrite-based PMSMs are not theoretical curiosities. They work. They spin. They produce torque.

Yet scaling them into the beating heart of the automotive industry is a different challenge altogether—where physics, durability, NVH, manufacturing culture, and deeply entrenched supply chains all exert a conservative gravitational pull.

Who’s Actually Shipping Magnet-Free Motors?

A handful of automakers have stepped into this new territory:

• BMW already sells its fifth-generation eDrive with a current-excited synchronous motor using _zero rare earths_—one of the first truly high-volume deployments.
• Renault and Nissan rely on electrically excited wound-rotor machines in models such as the ZOE and select Ariya variants, avoiding rare-earth magnets entirely.
• Tesla remains firmly NdFeB today, but has announced that its next-generation drive unit will eliminate rare earths—an ambitious design still moving toward volume.
• ZF, Valeo, BorgWarner and other Tier-1s are developing magnet-free or reduced-REE motor platforms targeting the latter half of the decade.

But the numbers are sobering: S&P Global Mobility (opens in a new tab) estimates that around 95% of all EV traction motors sold in 2025 still use rare-earth magnets. Magnet-free motors hold roughly a 5% share—commercially real, yes, but far from a takeover. But Rare Earth Exchanges™ (REEx) suggests there is likely robust upside for wining technology.

The Startups: Bold Minds, OEM Timelines

Enedym’s magnet-free SRM technology—validated by Honda and through rigorous benchmarking—is among the most credible REE-free pathways for two-wheelers and industrial vehicles. Their argument is elegant: with enough control sophistication, clever rotor geometry, and computational finesse, torque ripple, noise, and vibration can be tamed.

They are right. But automakers demand more: decades-long reliability curves, thermal aging behavior, failure-mode data, manufacturability, and cost predictability. Innovation sprints; OEMs walk. Adoption lags technology by three to six years.

The same pattern holds for Conifer, Turntide, and the emerging ferrite and iron-nitride innovators: impressive test benches, encouraging prototypes, but not yet Detroit-scale.

What About Drones? Not the REE-Free Paradise You’ve Heard

It is tempting to imagine drones as the secret non-REE pioneers. They iterate rapidly, operate at lower torques, and care intensely about cost. Yet in reality, most commercial drone BLDC motors remain heavily neodymium-dependent. Ferrite-based designs exist—but mostly in laboratories or specialty niches, not across major fleets.

Drones are an exciting test bed for non-REE motor architectures—not a near-term escape hatch from rare-earth demand.

Where This Is Headed

Rare-earth-free motors are not a fantasy. They are real, shipping in pockets of the market, and improving quickly. But they remain application-specific and far from displacing NdFeB permanent-magnet synchronous machines at the top of the performance stack.

S&P Global expects (opens in a new tab) REE-free motors to triple their market share by 2037, yet still represent a minority of global traction motors. This is but one forecast, and with technological advancement, markets can move faster than anticipated. REEx will monitor carefully. 

The most realistic view: this is a sector rising, not exploding; reshaping, not yet rewriting.

REEx will continue to track this frontier with rigor—because if magnet-free traction ever scales, it will not merely shift the auto industry. It will redraw the entire rare-earth demand curve.

© 2025 Rare Earth Exchanges™ – Accelerating Transparency, Accuracy, and Insight Across the Rare Earth & Critical Minerals Supply Chain.