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Umicore N.V. (Battery Materials)
Belgian specialty materials company (Euronext: UMI, HQ Brussels); battery materials division produces nickel hydroxide for NiMH batteries and NMC (nickel-manganese-cobalt) precursor for Li-ion EV batteries. Umicore was founded in 1906 as Union Minière du Haut Katanga — the mining company that extracted copper and uranium from Belgian Congo (now DRC). The same company that owned the Congo uranium mine whose output was used in the Manhattan Project (Little Boy and Fat Man bombs) now makes battery cathode materials for Toyota Prius and European EVs. Umicore sold its mining operations in 1991 and pivoted to materials technology; today it is one of the world's largest precious metals recyclers and a key producer of battery cathode materials.
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Battery Materials (NiMH & NMC)
40%Precious Metals Refining & Recycling
35%Catalysis (Automotive & Industrial)
20%Specialty Chemicals
5%
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Did you know2023
Umicore was founded in 1906 as Union Minière du Haut Katanga — the Belgian colonial company that controlled copper and uranium mining in the Belgian Congo (today's DRC). Union Minière's Shinkolobwe mine supplied the uranium used in the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, and in the first American nuclear reactor at the University of Chicago. In 1991, the company sold its mining operations and reinvented itself as a specialty materials technology company. Today Umicore makes battery cathode materials for Toyota (NiMH) and European EV makers (NMC), and operates one of the world's largest precious metals recycling operations. The company that supplied uranium for the Manhattan Project now supplies battery materials for the EV transition — perhaps the most remarkable corporate reinvention from weapons of mass destruction to climate technology in industrial history.
Umicore N.V. ↗Origin2023
Umicore's reinvention from Belgian colonial uranium miner to clean energy materials company spans over a century of industrial transformation, but the thread connecting the Manhattan Project to Toyota Prius batteries runs through the same Belgium-Congo nexus. Union Minière du Haut Katanga was created by the Belgian state in 1906 to exploit the mineral wealth of Belgian Congo (Katanga Province -- today's DRC Katanga). The company operated the Shinkolobwe uranium mine, whose high-grade ore (65% U3O8 versus typical 0.1-0.5% in US ores) was essential to the Manhattan Project after the Belgian Congo was cut off from Nazi Germany. Sengier, the then-managing director of Union Minière, had strategically stored 1,200 tonnes of uranium ore in Staten Island, New York in 1940, anticipating US strategic interest -- and was later awarded the US Medal for Merit for his role in making atomic bomb material available. Decades later, Union Minière sold its mining operations in 1991 and became Umicore in 2001, reinventing itself as a materials technology company. The company that controlled Congolese uranium for atomic bombs now produces the NMC cathode material in the batteries driving the decarbonization of transportation.
Umicore N.V. ↗