As the industry faces an urgent need to accelerate the build out of domestic infrastructure for critical supply chains, Graphex issues an update on its diverse upstream sources of quality raw material and domestic production expansion

This move by China may compel more aggressive collaboration between government, industry, and financial markets to build out the necessary resiliency of the graphite supply chain for the benefit of our economy and national security

Graphex Group Limited, together with its wholly owned U.S. subsidiary, Graphex Technologies, LLC (“Graphex” or the “Company”) (NYSE American: GRFX | HKSE: 6128), is pleased to comment on the recent news out of China regarding new controls on graphite exports, and to re-emphasize its strategic approach to deliver the necessary anode material to meet the needs of North American automakers and battery manufacturers for Lithium-ion batteries required for EVs, energy storage, and other advanced use cases..

Graphex has over a decade of large-scale graphite production experience and is currently among the top 10 global suppliers of specialized spherical graphite to the EV and renewable energy industries. Through various deliberate agreements secured over the last year, Graphex continues to secure raw graphite supply from numerous sources across the globe and in doing so, is well-positioned to bring large-scale domestic processing capability online beginning in 2024.

“The announcement to place controls on graphite exports is a loud wakeup call and a national security issue for the US and Canada, plain and simple, and we have been preparing for this,” said John DeMaio, CEO of Graphex Technologies. “As I shared recently with Reuters, the news out of China highlights the urgency to accelerate the build-out of domestic graphite supply, and although sudden, the announcement is not entirely surprising given that the Chinese graphite supply chain is mature, well-organized, and self-contained, and the local markets that it supports are growing. Adding in geopolitical tensions and IP concerns and this pull-back was foreseeable.”

Graphex’s current and future offtake agreements for raw materials emphasize the ex-China mine-to-battery approach preferred and/or required by automakers in North America. Global collaboration agreements with Graphex now include:

• Syrah Resources Limited, for natural flake graphite from Syrah’s Balama graphite operation in Mozambique.
• Northern Graphite Corporation, to aggregate Northern’s raw material in Canada and Namibia
• South Star Battery Metals, for supply from both Brazil and the United States, through the Santa Cruz Graphite Project and the Ceylon Graphite Project.
• Volt Resources, to provide graphite from its Bunyu Graphite Project in Tanzania
• Gratomic, for the natural graphite from its Aukam Project in Namibia
• Reforme Group, to provide material from its secured mineral deposits across Australia

“We recognized early on the vulnerability of the lopsided dependency on China for graphite supply, and since early 2022 we have been hyper focused on creating a completely separate ex-China graphite supply chain for North America,” added DeMaio. “The recent news only validates that our strategy continues to be sound, the need to accelerate growth is more urgent than ever, and prospects for the future in the industry are bright.”

​​About Graphex

Graphex is a multinational technology company focused on the development of technologies and products to enhance renewable energy, particularly the refining of natural spherical graphite, synthetic graphite, and graphene-related products - key components in EVs/Lithium-ion batteries as well as in other uses. Graphex has extensive commercial experience in the deep processing of graphite and producing battery grade graphite anode material. Current production is 10,000 tonnes per annum (tpa) with a current expansion underway to increase production to 50,000 tpa within the next 18 months,100,000 tpa over the next 36 months, and to 150,000 tpa or more by 2030. Graphex is currently among the top suppliers of specialized graphite anode material to the EV and renewable energy industries and holds patents in areas including products, production methods, machinery design, and environmental protection. Graphex’s strategy is to expand its operations globally to support energy transition and electrification efforts worldwide.

To learn more about Graphex Technologies, please visit www.graphexgroup.com.

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