Material Empire

People often say that rare earth is actually a collective name for 17 kinds of metal elements, which are lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, praseodymium, praseodymium, thallium, thallium, thallium, thorium, thorium, thorium, thorium, thallium, thallium, thallium, thorium, yttrium . According to different physical and chemical properties, rare earths are divided into light rare earths and heavy rare earths. Light rare earths include the above 7 elements from lanthanum to europium, and heavy rare earths are the remaining 10 elements.

The content of rare earth elements in the crust is not low, but only the rare earth elements enriched together can form mineral deposits with mining value. The rare earth ores found so far are mainly divided into monazite ore, fluorocarbon ceria, xenotime and ion-adsorbed rare earth ore.

Monazite and fluorocarbon-cerium ore are widely distributed. For example, the well-known Mountain Pass rare earth mine in California is a fluorocarbon-cerium ore. The rare earths produced by these two types of ore are mainly light rare earths such as lanthanum and cerium.

The xenotime and ion-adsorbed rare earth ore are mainly heavy rare earth, of which the latter contains the most complete heavy rare earth elements, and this rare earth ore is only found in southern China at present, and no similar discovery has been made in other countries.

Due to the different distribution of minerals including different rare-earth elements, the proven reserves of various rare-earth elements vary widely, which in turn affects their prices. Among the various rare earth elements, light rare earth lanthanum and cerium are the cheapest. They were once called "Chinese cabbage price", and the prices of elements such as praseodymium and neodymium are slightly higher, but they are not expensive. In contrast, the prices of heavy rare earths are very different. The prices of oxides of elements such as praseodymium and praseodymium are hundreds of times higher than those of lanthanum and cerium oxide, and dozens of times higher than those of praseodymium and neodymium oxide.

Figure out the difference between rare earths and the price difference. It is not difficult to understand why various institutions studying rare earth permanent magnet materials have focused on light rare earth. The reason is nothing more than the desire to reduce the price of permanent magnet materials so that they can be more widely used.

The main material of NdFeB is light rare earth neodymium. The price of neodymium oxide per ton is only US $ 30,000 to 40,000, which enables the price of neodymium iron boron to be controlled below US $ 30,000 per ton. If the main rare earth materials are replaced by 镝 and 铽 which are ten times more expensive, then the price of new permanent magnet materials will inevitably increase by more than ten times, which is unbearable for the industry using permanent magnet materials.

After Sun Yuzhi revealed that the new permanent magnet material is a mixed sintered product of samarium iron boron and samarium iron boron, Hirano's first thought was the cost issue.

Even the new permanent magnet materials are more magnetic than NdFeB. If its price is more than 10 times that of NdFeB, then its market value will be greatly reduced.

I didn't wait for Masao Hirano to figure this out. Sun Yuzhi's next sentence completely destroyed his hesitation: "After our experimental verification, the Curie temperature of samarium ferroalloy can reach 700 degrees Celsius, which is much higher than 350 degrees Celsius of neodymium iron boron."

The so-called Curie temperature. Simply put, it is the temperature at which the magnet loses its magnetism. One of the Achilles' heel of NdFeB is that its Curie temperature is only about 350 degrees Celsius. Even if it is improved by adding other elements, it can only be raised to about 460 degrees Celsius. Because the Curie temperature is too low, in some high-temperature occasions, NdFeB has no use.

Because of knowing this weakness of neodymium iron boron, when Sun Yuzhi said that the Curie temperature of the new permanent magnet material can reach 700 degrees Celsius, Hirano's eyes suddenly widened, and he immediately realized. The emergence of this new material will pose a fatal threat to NdFeB.

No, we must get a patent license for rhenium alloy. Otherwise we will be squeezed out of the permanent magnetic material market. NdFeB will become an obsolete low-end material, and even if it is not eliminated, its profit margin will be squeezed to an extremely poor level.

Once Hirano had understood this, he immediately dropped his previous arrogance and said to Qin Hai, "Chairman Qin, please allow me to congratulate you on the discovery of this new type of permanent magnet material. I believe that it will definitely become NdFeB is a new material with a comparable status. Chunshan Club is very interested in cooperating with your company on this new material. I wonder what conditions of cooperation you hope for. "

Qin Hai said lightly: "Mr. Hirano, you were wrong. The appearance of rhenium alloy is not only equivalent to the status of neodymium-iron-boron, but it may replace neodymium-iron-boron. I think you should be able see."

"This ... I'm afraid Chairman Qin is too optimistic, right?" Hirano Masao said arrogantly, Qin Hai said exactly the same as his idea, but he could not publicly agree. As long as he devalues ​​the value of hafnium alloy, he will be able to win the best cooperation conditions for Chunshan Club. This is very clear to him.

Nakagawa Yuanjiu also thought about this problem, and he reluctantly interjected: "Chairman Qin, you should know that neodymium-iron-boron is a mature product, and rhenium-iron alloy is not mature enough yet ..."

As soon as that was said, Hirano had almost a desire to choke this pig teammate. Maturity and immaturity are only relative matters, and immature technology will eventually mature. Nakagawa Motohisa's remarks at first seemed to be devaluing the value of hafnium ferroalloy, but in fact he passed the handle to his opponent.

Of course, Qin Hai will not miss this opportunity. He laughed and said, "Mr. Nakagawa said well. The ferroalloy is indeed just new and very immature. However, even this immature product shows In order to surpass the competitiveness of NdFeB, does this not indicate that this product has great market potential? We are very willing to work with Chunshan Club to improve this new material to a higher level. If Chunshan Club at this time Unwilling to participate in joint development. When this technology matures in the future, the conditions for cooperation will probably be higher than now. "

"Uh, Chairman Qin, you can't say that ... the price of samarium ferroalloy is much higher than that of neodymium iron boron. This is an undeniable defect. We believe that this defect will seriously hinder the market promotion of samarium ferroalloy. "Said Hirano Masao.

Sun Yuzhi said: "Mr. Hirano, we are aware of the problem you are talking about. We are now working to improve this product and try to reduce the content of radon and radon by adding other elements, so that it can effectively reduce its Price. I have already told Chairman Qin that if we can get the support of Chunshan, our research process will be greatly accelerated. "

"I am very grateful for Sun Jun's good intentions." Hirano Masao gave a slight bow to Sun Yuzhi, and then turned to Qin Hai. "Chairman Qin, as Sun Jun said, our participation in Chunshan Company is perfect for your company.铽 Ferroalloy material is helpful, so we hope that your company can propose a more sincere cooperation condition so that both of us can reach the cooperation intention as soon as possible. "

"Well ... okay." Qin Haizhuang was half-pushing and said, "Professor Sun did talk to me, hoping to cooperate with Chunshan, especially Mr. Hirano and Mr. Nakagawa. Our consideration is, hope Can use the patent of samarium ferroalloy to exchange the patent of NdFeB with Chunshan Company. The two parties make improvements to the product within the scope of the patent. The technology is shared by both parties. What does Mr. Hirano think? "

NdFeB was invented by the Japanese. At the beginning of the invention, Japanese companies applied for patents for a full range of products, of which the patents owned by Chunshan Company are the most critical. Under the protection of patents, if companies in other countries want to produce neodymium-iron-boron products, they must pay the patent fee to Chunshan Company. When it comes to patent issues, you can't get around.

Sadly, in fact, Chinese scholars did not study neodymium-iron-boron later than Japanese scholars. It was only because of insufficient patent awareness and lack of attention to the commercialization of technology that this made an important patent such as neodymium-iron-boron. Exclusive possession. Before the NdFeB patent expired, China, as a big producer of NdFeB, had to hand a lot of profits into the hands of the Japanese every year.

Qin Hai understands the cause and effect of this matter. If he can travel a few years early, he will probably grab the patent of NdFeB before the Japanese. Now, the patent of neodymium-iron-boron has been possessed by the Japanese. What he can do is to exchange the patent of the samarium-iron alloy developed by Sun Yuzhi with the Japanese.

"Patent exchange?" This condition proposed by Qin Hai made Hirano Masao a moment's attention, and immediately fell into deep thought.

The value of the neodymium iron boron patent is very clear to Hirano. If this patent is taken out and shared with Daqin Group, once Daqin Group enters the neodymium-iron-boron industry, Chunshan will lose a large amount of royalties. You know, China is a big country with rare earth. The cost of producing NdFeB is far lower than that of Japan ~ www.novelmtl.com ~ Daqin Group can easily **** most of the overseas market of Chunshan Company.

However, without exchanging patents, Chunshan will be even more risky. The replacement of neodymium-iron alloy with neodymium-iron-boron is a foreseeable thing. If Chunshan cannot obtain a patent license for samarium ferroalloy, it will not be able to enter this market, and can only watch as Daqin Group squeezes out neodymium iron boron with samarium ferroalloy. In this emerging ferroalloy market, Chunshan Company does not even want to fish.

It is cost-effective to trade a market facing recession in exchange for a booming market.

"Chairman Qin, I can't decide this matter, but I will forward your request to the company headquarters as soon as possible, and the company headquarters will soon send a commissioner to negotiate with your company." Hirano Masao decided to stabilize Qin Hai first, Make a decision. He also said: "We still need to identify the properties of samarium ferroalloys. Can you please provide us with some samples for our research?"

"Yes, we are always waiting for the arrival of your company commissioner." Qin Hai agreed quickly. (To be continued)

ps: Explain: the ferroalloy is the author's fiction, let's think it is the black technology of the 22nd century ...