Highlights

• Multinational companies and governments are actively restructuring rare earth supply chains to reduce reliance on Chinese dominance.
• Significant investments and partnerships are emerging across mining, processing, and magnet manufacturing sectors in the US, Australia, and India.
• Strategic moves include government-backed funding, long-term offtake agreements, and technology collaborations to build resilient rare earth ecosystems.

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Every week, Rare Earth Exchanges (REEx) runs the weekly deal report. This week, we reported on some Africa-to-Australia partnerships. Some of the deals we pick up on from a few weeks prior.

A major upstream deal was struck in Africa. Lindian Resources (opens in a new tab) of Australia, on August 6, 2025, reported on a binding offtake agreement (opens in a new tab) with Iluka Resources (opens in a new tab) to develop Lindian’s flagship Kangankunde rare earths project in Malawi (opens in a new tab). Under the 15-year pact, Lindian is to supply Iluka’s new Eneabba refinery in Western Australia with 6,000 tonnes per year of monazite concentrate (containing neodymium and praseodymium) once production begins.

Deal Terms Include Ex-China Floor

In return, Iluka is providing a US$20 million construction loan (opens in a new tab) over five years to help fund Kangankunde’s mine build-out strategicmetalsinvest.com (opens in a new tab). The deal not only secures a long-term rare earth feedstock for Iluka’s government-backed refinery, but also de-risks one of the world’s largest undeveloped rare earth deposits. Kangankunde boasts an estimated 5.7 million tonnes of total rare earth oxides with a particularly high percentage of magnet metals NdPr. Iluka has even negotiated rights of first refusal on a major expansion phase (opens in a new tab), indicating strong confidence in this Malawi-Australia supply chain link

Notably, the agreement includes a floor price mechanism above Kangankunde’s production cost, with upside sharing if government price support is introduced at Eneabba. This illustrates how Western producers are structuring deals to ensure viability despite China’s historically volatile pricing.

U.S. Processing Boost

On the eve of this week, the U.S. Department of Defense executed a milestone financing to shore up domestic midstream processing. Through its new Office of Strategic Capital, the DoD issued a $150 million loan (opens in a new tab) to MP Materials – owner of America’s sole rare earth mine – to add heavy rare earth separation capacity at its Mountain Pass site defense.gov (opens in a new tab).

This marks the first loan under a July U.S.-MP Materials investment accord and will fund facilities to produce critical heavy rare earth oxides domestically by the late decade.

The Pentagon’s backing comes with strategic strings: in a July deal, DoD became MP’s largest shareholder and guaranteed a price floor of $110/kg for key magnet metals – roughly double the going Chinese price reuters.com (opens in a new tab). Such support reflects a new reality: Western governments are directly intervening to counter China’s pricing power and jump-start local supply chains. Australia’s resources ministry is likewise considering price floors for critical minerals to give investors certainty. These moves signal that upstream and midstream deals now often intertwine with policy, blending public and private capital to rebalance the rare earth market.

Note: MP Materials' stock has surged.  Many of our community members want to know if they should sell and take gains or keep holding on. This depends on a confluence of factors. While we do not offer financial advice, we are happy to discuss in the Forum (opens in a new tab) as well.

Magnet Manufacturing and Supply Deals

What about venture funding flows? Investors are piling into rare earth magnet ventures to scale up production outside China. This week Vulcan Elements, a North Carolina-based rare earth magnet startup, announced a $65 million Series A funding round (opens in a new tab). The raise – led by tech-focused Altimeter Capital (opens in a new tab) with participation from One Investment (the fund of ex-SoftBank executive Rajeev Misra (opens in a new tab)) – will bankroll Vulcan’s first commercial-scale NdFeB magnet plant in Durham, NC.

Vulcan launched a 21,000 ft² pilot facility in March and now plans to ramp output to several hundred metric tons of sintered neodymium-iron-boron magnets annually in the next few years. By decade’s end, production is targeted in the thousands of tons, a quantum leap for U.S. magnet capacity. Crucially, Vulcan prides itself on a supply chain “decoupled from China,” sourcing all raw materials and equipment from the U.S. or allies.

Of course, today China manufactures over 90% of the world’s rare earth magnets while the U.S. produces <1%, a strategic vulnerability laid bare when Beijing briefly halted exports this spring, mining.com. Vulcan’s funding – coupled with federal support like the DoD’s magnet price guarantees – aims to close that gap. As CEO John Maslin (opens in a new tab) put it, the investment lets Vulcan “scale with the speed and seriousness that this moment… demands,” with Pentagon policy shifting in their favor (opens in a new tab).

Automotive and Industrial Offtakes

In the downstream magnet market, a flurry of supply agreements is locking in non-Chinese magnet sources for manufacturers. On August 14, ABB (opens in a new tab), the global industrial tech company, revealed (opens in a new tab) a multi-year agreement with Texas-based Noveon Magnetics (opens in a new tab) to procure high-performance NdFeB magnets for ABB’s electric motors and drives made in North America.

Noveon, according to their press release, is currently the only U.S. producer (opens in a new tab) of sintered neodymium magnets. They will begin monthly deliveries immediately and scale up to supply 100% of the magnet components at ABB’s main N.A. motor plant by 2026. This “made-in-USA” magnet deal fortifies ABB’s supply chain for critical motor parts used in everything from factory pumps to data center cooling systems. Company officials noted that having a secure domestic magnet source is key to meeting booming demand for efficient electrification equipment.

The ABB-Noveon partnership comes just a week after General Motors inked a landmark magnet supply deal with Noveon for its electric and hybrid vehicle programs, as reported via Rare Earth Exchanges (REEx). (Noveon has already begun delivering magnets for GM’s full-size SUVs and pickup trucks as of July, per Reuters. reuters.com (opens in a new tab).) With these back-to-back wins, Noveon is emerging as a linchpin in American magnet re-shoring – its EcoFlux™ magnet line (opens in a new tab) uses recycled rare earth feedstock and promises top-tier performance without Chinese inputs.

Diverse End-Use Partnerships

Beyond autos and industry, rare earth deals are spreading into niche sectors. USA Rare Earth (USAR) (opens in a new tab) – which went public earlier this year – announced an MOU with Enduro Pipeline Services to supply made-in-USA neodymium magnets for “smart pig” pipeline inspection devices. Enduro’s pipeline pigs use powerful magnets to scrape debris and detect flaws inside oil and gas pipelines. Under the agreement (announced August 12), USAR will deliver domestically produced NdFeB magnets from its Stillwater, Oklahoma, facility once it comes online in early 2026.

This deal underscores that critical magnet demand spans well beyond EV motors and wind turbines – even pipeline maintenance gear needs rare earth magnets for reliability. For USA Rare Earth, which is building a 310,000 ft² magnet plant in Oklahoma, such offtake agreements help validate its fully domestic mine-to-magnet supply chain strategy.

The company has been busy lining up partners in various industries – just last week it inked a joint development agreement to supply drone motor magnets for ePropelled, a New Hampshire electric aviation firm, showing a “mid-market” focus on drones and defense in addition to big-name OEMs. As USA Rare Earth Joshua Ballard shared with the REEx podcast, the company now targets the small-to-midsized space (opens in a new tab). As USAR’s CEO has emphasized, expanding the customer base for U.S.-made magnets is key to scaling production and reducing costs. The Enduro tie-up, though smaller in scale, reinforces confidence that homegrown magnet supply can find ready buyers across the economy, not just in vehicles.

Global Strategic Shifts

Deals in Asia this week highlight how rare earth supply chain realignment is a truly global affair. In India, the government-owned miner IREL (Indian Rare Earths Ltd (opens in a new tab)) is actively courting international partners to kickstart local magnet production. According to a Reuters report, IREL is in talks with entities in Japan and South Korea – possibly via government-to-government channels – to secure advanced magnet manufacturing technology and expertise per Reuters (opens in a new tab).

India currently has no commercial-scale magnet plant and limited refining capacity. But after China’s rare earth export curbs in April disrupted global supply chains, New Delhi is racing to reduce reliance on Chinese materials. IREL has even met with Toyota Tsusho’s Indian unit to explore a proposal for a Japanese magnet maker to build a plant in India. Parallelly, the state miner is looking to expand upstream mining both at home and abroad – eyeing rare earth deposits as far afield as Argentina, Australia, Malawi, and Myanmar. This multi-pronged approach by India – seeking foreign JVs for processing while securing raw material sources – mirrors broader trends across the world. Nations rich in resources but lacking processing know-how are teaming up with those that have the technology, all in a bid to create regional supply chains independent of China.

Actions in China

Meanwhile, China, though quiet on new deals this week, continues to expand and reorganize its dominant rare earth industry. State-owned Northern Rare Earth Group (CNRE) reported stronger-than-expected domestic demand and is aggressively building capacity as reported by REEx. 

REEx also reported that CNRE just completed a 5,000-ton/year magnet plant via a joint venture and launched another high-end magnet materials factory in Inner Mongolia. It’s also constructing a massive 50,000-ton/year NdFeB alloy plant to solidify China’s grip on magnet production, as we reported here.

These investments will feed China’s own EV, wind, and high-tech sectors – and signal that Beijing is not standing still as the West scrambles to build capacity. Chinese officials have paired industry growth with tight new policies (export license controls, quietly raised production quotas) to manage supply and keep a strategic advantage. Notably, after June trade talks, Beijing temporarily eased export licensing, and rare earth exports briefly surged to record highs, only to plummet 23% in July as controls reasserted. The on-off export flows and talk of a “truce” expiring in August keep buyers on edge.

All of this underlines why the flurry of non-China deals – from Malawi to Texas – is intensifying. Supply chain resilience has become paramount. As one U.S. consultant observed after the Pentagon’s intervention, “This is a game changer for the ex-China industry”. The deals struck this week, though varied in nature, all share a common goal: to rewire the rare earth ecosystem before the next shock hits.

Conclusion

The week of August 11, 2025 showcased a rare earth sector in rapid motion. Across continents, companies and governments inked deals at every step of the supply chain – mines, processors, magnet makers, and end-users – to fortify their positions. An Australian miner secured funding and offtake to bring an African rare earth mine to life. American magnet startups raised big money from private equity to scale production onshore. Industrial giants like ABB cut reliance on imports by locking in homegrown magnet supplies. Even pipeline maintenance and drone companies joined the action, partnering with new U.S. magnet producers to source critical components.

And on the geopolitical stage, emerging players such as India ramped up efforts to enter the fray, seeking collaborators to jump-start their own rare earth industries. All these moves are responses to the same impetus: China’s longstanding dominance – and its recent willingness to weaponize that dominance – has made supply security a strategic imperative. The flurry of deals this week adds more building blocks to an emerging global mosaic of rare earth alliances. While it will take years for many of these projects to reach fruition, the momentum is undeniable.

Each new agreement, investment, or joint venture is another step toward a more diversified, resilient rare earth supply chain, one that can meet soaring demand for EVs, clean energy, and advanced technologies without being beholden to a single nation’s whims. The race is on, and last week’s developments show that around the world, stakeholders are picking up the pace.

Sources: Rare Earth Exchanges, company press releases, Reuters, MINING.com, and other industry newsstrategicmetalsinvest.com (opens in a new tab)prnewswire.com (opens in a new tab)mining.com (opens in a new tab)reuters.com (opens in a new tab).