When it begins operating in July 2027, Solcoa One will be one of the largest rare earth metallization operations in the Western world, producing 500 tonnes per year for robotics, electrification, and defense.

Solcoa Industries today announced $75 million in financing to build Solcoa One, its first commercial rare earth metalmaking plant. The round includes $45 million in equity led by Bain Capital Ventures, with participation from Gigascale Capital, Long Journey, Felicis, Dylan Field, and prominent leaders across defense and technology. It also includes $30 million in debt and equipment financing, anchored by J.P. Morgan. The financing will fund construction and commissioning of Solcoa One, expanded reactor manufacturing in Alameda, and growth of the company's engineering and research teams.

Rare earth metals are the essential ingredient in the high-powered magnets that power electric vehicles, robots, and critical defense systems. Converting refined oxides into metal (metallization) is a major bottleneck. China controls 95% of global metallization capacity, and the legacy processes are expensive, hazardous, and difficult to permit.

U.S. defense rules (DFARS 252.225-7052) already bar contractors from buying samarium-cobalt and neodymium-iron-boron magnets produced in China, Russia, Iran, or North Korea. Beginning January 1, 2027, the ban extends to any such magnet whose rare earths were mined, refined, separated, melted, or produced in those countries. Defense suppliers have months to secure compliant metal, and metalmaking is the step where allied capacity is thinnest.

Solcoa was founded in 2025 to close that gap. The company develops halide-free chemistries, engineers the processes, and builds and operates its own modular reactors. Compared with legacy molten-salt electrolysis, Solcoa's process is faster, uses less energy, costs less, and is cleaner. Solcoa’s process produces zero harmful emissions, including the extremely toxic fluoride gases and perfluorocarbons (potent greenhouse gases) associated with the legacy process. Each reactor takes weeks to build in Alameda, with capacity added in steady increments rather than waiting years for a conventional plant.

"You will not beat China by copying China. The last time America invented a fundamentally new way to make a primary metal was with titanium in the 1940s, and that breakthrough built an entire industry," said Hooman Reza Nezhad, CEO of Solcoa Industries. "We believe rare earths are the foundation of America's next great industrial era, and we intend to win on the merits of superior American technology."

In under a year, Solcoa has grown from a lab-scale research reactor to producing more than 10 tonnes of magnet-grade metal a year. It has become one of the very few companies outside China capable of producing NdPr and samarium metal. Solcoa is shipping from Alameda today, ahead of the 2027 deadline. Solcoa One will take production to 500 tonnes a year, enough NdPr to supply up to one million electric vehicles.

"Solcoa is already producing rare earth metal at 10 tonnes a year, with a process clean enough to run right here in Alameda, something legacy metallization never could. In just one year, the team has validated a genuinely novel process and chemistry, and they're scaling fast toward commercially meaningful tonnage," said Mike Schroepfer, former CTO of Meta and Founding Partner of Gigascale Capital.

"American manufacturers have had no real alternative to a Chinese-controlled supply chain for the metal inside every high-performance magnet, and the 2027 defense deadline makes that a today problem,” said Alysaa Co, Partner at Bain Capital Ventures. “Solcoa closes that gap with a process invented and proven on U.S. soil, at a scale that actually matters.”

"Western production of magnet-grade rare earth metals rounds to zero, posing an urgent and growing threat to domestic technology and defense industries. Solcoa is the only company attacking this problem with innovation and scale. We're proud to back Hooman and his team as they build the metals company America needs," said James Detweiler, General Partner at Felicis.

About Solcoa Industries

Solcoa Industries is the fastest-growing American rare earth metals producer. Founded in 2025 and headquartered in Alameda, California, Solcoa develops next-generation chemistries and processes and builds the production systems that produce the metals essential to electrification, automation, and defense. The company currently produces samarium and neodymium-praseodymium (NdPr) metal at its Alameda facility and is building Solcoa One, a 500-tonne-per-year plant in Nevada.

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