Canada-based NextSource Materials Inc. executed a Letter of Intent (LOI) with its Japanese offtake partner and a leading Chinese processor of graphite anode material to collaborate on the construction of a value-add, battery anode plant in a jurisdiction that is proximal to the Company’s Molo graphite project in Madagascar.

Source: NextSource Materials

To protect certain confidential aspects of the LOI, the Japanese trading company and the Chinese SPG producer have requested not to be identified at this time.

As announced in October 2018, NextSource signed a 10-year offtake agreement with a prominent Japanese trading company to purchase 20,000 tonnes per year of Molo SuperFlake graphite for use in battery anode applications for electric and hybrid vehicles.

NextSource’s Japanese partner is a major supplier of spheronized and purified graphite (SPG) for anode material in lithium-ion batteries (LiB) for electric vehicle (EV) and hybrid vehicle (HEV) applications. Its EV and HEV automotive anode customers are global and currently supply graphite anode material to the majority of Japanese automotive OEMs.

Since 2018, NextSource and its Japanese partner have been in discussions regarding potential supply chain collaboration to supply value-added graphite material using SuperFlake graphite concentrate.

The Chinese partner is one of the top processors of SPG for the EV and HEV markets and has verified that NextSource’s SuperFlake graphite concentrate meets or exceeds all quality requirements for SPG material for EV and HEV automotive applications.

Its EV and HEV anode customers are global, including the North American market and its interest in the partnership with NextSource and the its Japanese partner is to have an additional SPG facility located outside of China and close to a high-quality mine source of flake graphite to supply international automotive OEM customers.

The Molo is a full-feasibility-stage project and ranks as one of the largest-known and highest quality flake graphite deposits in the world. The Molo Project hosts a National Instrument-43-101-compliant total combined graphite resource of 141.28 million tonnes (Mt) at 6.13% total graphitic carbon (C), with a contained ore reserve of 22.44 Mt at 7.02%C.

Source: NextSource Materials

Madagascar is renowned worldwide for its high-quality flake graphite and has been a traditional producer for over a century but has never exceeded 12,000 tonnes of production annually. Currently, annual production of flake graphite averages about 5,000 tonnes. NextSource Materials’ Molo deposit represents the first new and substantial graphite discovery in the country in over 50 years.