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Breakthrough in 5N9 grade tantalum targets! China’s tantalum and niobium industry is shedding its label as a ‘low-end smelter’ – Original article by Northern Nonferrous Metals Network, June 3, 2026, 19:23, Beijing. If, in the past few decades, China’s tantalum and niobium industry was perceived as a ‘resource transporter’ and a ‘low-end processor’, then today that label is being removed at an accelerating pace. In 2025, Orient Tantalum successfully developed an ultra-high-purity tantalum target billet with a purity level of 99.9999% (5N9), thereby completely reversing China’s long-standing reliance on imports for key materials used in the integrated circuit industry. Coincidentally, thanks to its mass-production technology for thin-film lithium niobate modulators, Guangku Technology has become one of only three companies in the world, and the only one in China, capable of mass-producing products on 8-inch wafers. It supplies these products in bulk to leading clients such as NVIDIA and Google, achieving a gross margin of over 70%. China’s tantalum and niobium industry is making an all-out push toward high-end manufacturing at an unprecedented pace. I. From “laborers” to “problem-solvers”: two pathways for technological breakthroughs. Tantalum targets are a core component of semiconductor sputtering targets, primarily used in the physical vapor deposition process involved in chip manufacturing. For a long time, the technology for ultra-high-purity tantalum targets has been monopolized by a few foreign companies, becoming a bottleneck that hinders the development of China’s semiconductor industry. The breakthrough for Orient Tantalum lies in establishing a complete chain that encompasses \"tantalum powder purification – formation of large-sized target blanks – and a seamless production line across the entire process.\" In the process of tantalum powder purification, the company developed a new purification technique that increases the purity of the tantalum powder to 5N9 level ； To address the challenges associated with forming large-sized target blanks, the R&D team innovatively resolved issues related to material density and uniformity, thereby achieving a technological breakthrough and full industrial implementation for 12-inch high-purity tantalum target blanks. What’s more noteworthy is that Orient Tantalum has established a complete closed loop covering “research and development – production – application”. Relying on a **-level scientific research platform, it utilizes the MES system to achieve intelligent production control, ensuring the consistency of performance across all product batches. Its products are now used in high-end manufacturing sectors such as semiconductors and aerospace. In the cutting-edge field of niobium-based materials, Optic Library Technology’s strategic approach is also worth paying attention to. By 2025, the revenue generated by Optic Library Technology’s optical communication components will exceed that of its fiber laser components for the first time. The thin-film lithium niobate modulators are already compatible with 800G/1.6T high-speed optical modules, and their power consumption is 40% lower than that of silicon-based solutions. At the same time, Guangku Technology is one of only two companies in the world that possesses full-scale IDM capabilities for bulk lithium niobate, with Fujitsu in Japan being the other. This comprehensive control over the entire technological chain is a microcosm of how China’s tantalum and niobium enterprises are transitioning from “breakthroughs at individual points” to “systemic breakthroughs”. II. Cruel ice and fire: breakthroughs in high-end technologies versus competition in low-end areas. Yet, we must face the fact that while breakthroughs in high-end technologies are advancing rapidly, the structural problems in low-end sectors remain persistent. From a global industrial perspective, the technical barriers in the tantalum and niobium industry are mainly characterized by “three highs”: high temperatures, high vacuum, and highly corrosive media. This field involves multiple interdisciplinary areas such as materials science, precision machining, and automated control; consequently, the preparation technologies are extremely difficult to master. The purity of sputtering targets for semiconductors must be at least 5N5, with key impurities to be controlled at the ppb level ； The control of the grain size and texture orientation of tantalum targets is a crucial issue determining the product performance. These technical barriers mean that making the transition from basic processing to high-end manufacturing is by no means something that can be achieved in a short time. At the resource level, the challenges are equally severe. China is extremely short of tantalum resources; the ore grades are low and the associated minerals are complex, resulting in a high degree of dependence on imports for a long time. This means that while the domestic substitution of high-purity tantalum targets is advancing steadily, China still lacks sufficient capacity for self-sufficiency in terms of resources. At the market level, the “one high and one low” price divergence is even more evident. According to statistics from industry organizations, in the first half of 2025, the price of ordinary niobium oxide remained in the range of 180,000 to 220,000 yuan per ton, while high-purity niobium oxide of optical grade (used in optical glass, crystal materials, etc.) sold for as much as 800,000 to 1,200,000 yuan per ton, representing a price difference of 4 to 5 times. For the same ton of ore, producing ordinary products yields a value of only 200,000, while purifying it to optical glass grade allows it to be sold for nearly one million. This is a perfect illustration of how technological level directly determines the added value. III. Understanding the roadmap for technological transformation 1. Higher purity: from “acceptable” to “excellent”. In the field of tantalum materials, purity is the key factor that determines the level of technology. Generally, the purity of electronic-grade tantalum powder needs to be 4N5 or higher, and it is mainly used in traditional fields such as tantalum capacitors and chemical corrosion prevention equipment ； For sputtering tantalum targets used in semiconductors, a purity level of 5N5 to 6N or higher is required; key impurities must be controlled at the parts-per-billion level. The purity of the tantalum powder used to produce high-purity tantalum targets by Orient Tantalum Industry has reached 99.998% (4N8), with the total content of refractory metal impurities being less than 0.4 ppm, meeting the requirements for raw materials used in 6N high-purity tantalum targets. A single tiny impurity can render an entire chip manufactured using advanced processes useless. Taking 6N (99.9999%) tantalum ingots and 4N8 tantalum powder as examples: the former is used for barrier films in logic chips below 7nm, requiring an oxygen content of less than 50 ppm and a grain size controlled within 50μm ； The latter meets the requirements of applications in high-end tantalum capacitors and chemical corrosion-resistant equipment. The jump in purity from 4N to 6N is not merely a change in the digits after the decimal point; it represents a fundamental transition from “usable” to “truly excellent”. 2. Nanosization: It’s in the details that true quality is revealed. Meanwhile, the trend towards “nanosization” of tantalum materials cannot be overlooked either. With the increasingly stringent demands placed on RF modules in 5G smartphones regarding high-frequency response and stability of capacitors, it is necessary to use high-purity tantalum powder with finer particles and superior dielectric properties to manufacture multilayer ceramic capacitors. The particle size of the material directly determines the limits of its electrical properties. Whether it’s conventional micron-sized tantalum powder or sub-micron or even nano-sized particles, there is a qualitative change in specific surface area, sintering activity, and impurity distribution. This represents a crucial leap from macro-scale smelting to micro-level control, and it is also a technical hurdle that only a few companies in the country are able to overcome. 3. Additive manufacturing makes it possible to overcome the challenges associated with materials that are difficult to machine. Tantalum metal has a melting point of up to 3017°C, and traditional machining methods face issues such as high tool wear, high energy consumption, and a material utilization rate of only 10%–20%. The advent of additive manufacturing (3D printing) technology is fundamentally changing this situation. The aerospace industry is the forefront application scenario for this technology. In 2025, UK-based space company Skyrora collaborated with the European Space Agency to develop a tantalum-niobium-based high-temperature alloy named “Tanbium”. This alloy is intended for 3D printing of rocket engine components; it can help reduce the weight of these components by up to 30%, cut material waste by 95%, and lower component manufacturing costs by 40%. In China, tantalum-tungsten alloy components have been used in the thermal protection systems of hypersonic vehicles. For a certain satellite thruster, 3D printing enabled its integral formation, resulting in a 30% reduction in weight and a 25% decrease in launch costs. The significance of this technical approach is that, in the past, due to the difficulty of processing tantalum-tungsten alloys, many designs with excellent properties could only remain on paper ； Today, 3D printing makes complex internal flow channels, lattice structures, and functionally graded materials a reality. 3D printing is transforming tantalum and niobium materials from being “laboriously crafted” to being “precisely shaped”, thus opening up entirely new avenues for the manufacturing of high-performance components in extreme environments. IV. Technical roadmap: A deciding factor for a company’s survival. From powder metallurgy to the manufacturing of superconducting cavities, the choice of a technical roadmap is never merely a matter for the R&D department; it is a strategic issue that determines whether a company will survive or perish. The pathways to achieving breakthroughs in multiple key processes—from mining and beneficiation to deep processing—are the inevitable route to the manufacturing of high-end tantalum and niobium materials. On this path, every step of falling behind means elimination, while every step ahead has the potential to reshape the industry landscape. By 2026, China’s tantalum and niobium industry will be at a pivotal point of transformation. In the past, what we sold were resources ； Now, what we’re competing on is precision. Whether it’s high-purity target materials, optical-grade oxides, or high-end powders for 3D printing, whoever manages to establish a complete technological chain encompassing “high purification—nanosizing—precision processing” first will gain a strategic advantage in the new competitive landscape.