Korea Zinc (010130) is posting a string of results in the new businesses it has cultivated as future growth engines, giving concrete shape to the "Troika Drive" strategy that Chairman Choi Yun-beom has pushed forward.
Troika Drive is a medium- to long-term strategy built on three pillars — renewable energy and green hydrogen, secondary battery materials, and resource recycling. Its core aim is to extend the manufacturing expertise accumulated in the company's existing non-ferrous metal smelting business into advanced future industries.
KEMCO affiliate KZAM, the wholly focused secondary battery materials subsidiary, has been mass-producing battery copper foil since June and supplying it to a global battery customer, Korea Zinc said on the 3rd. It marks the company's first customer shipment, achieved six years after its establishment in 2020. KZAM has aggressively pursued copper foil research and development since secondary battery materials were included in the chairman's Troika Drive.
Copper foil serves as the anode current collector in batteries and is a core material affecting energy density, charging performance and battery life. KZAM improved process stability by drawing on Korea Zinc's dissolution and electrolysis technologies and its smelting know-how.
The copper foil produced by KZAM is set to be used in batteries manufactured in North America. Korea Zinc expects the shipments to generate up to 40 billion won in revenue and plans to use its entry into the North American battery supply chain as a foothold to expand its presence in the local market. The achievement carries added weight because it came at a time when materials companies worldwide are struggling to expand operations amid the global electric vehicle chasm, a temporary slowdown in demand.
KZAM's copper foil production is organically linked to Korea Zinc's new resource recycling business. Under the structure, secondary raw materials such as electronic waste secured by Pedal Point, Korea Zinc's U.S. resource recycling subsidiary, are supplied to the Onsan smelter in Ulsan, which extracts eco-friendly copper that KZAM then recycles as copper foil feedstock. The result is a complete resource recycling value chain running from electronic waste to secondary raw materials, eco-friendly copper and battery-grade copper foil.
Good news is also arriving in the critical minerals business. KEMCO, another subsidiary, has begun test operations for crude germanium, an intermediate product, and will start full-scale sales in the first quarter of next year. The company is investing 55.7 billion won to expand a gallium recovery line at the Onsan smelter, with commercial production to begin in 2028. Both materials are follow-up results of a supply memorandum of understanding signed with U.S. defense contractor Lockheed Martin in August last year, and their mass-production timelines were moved up sharply in response to China's export controls on critical minerals.
Korea Zinc is also making headway in expanding the supply chain for ultra-high-purity sulfuric acid, an essential material for Korea's advanced semiconductor industry. The company recently completed the expansion of semiconductor-grade sulfuric acid production lines No. 20 and No. 21 at the Onsan smelter and has begun full operations. With the two lines adding roughly 40,000 tons of annual capacity, Korea Zinc's yearly output capacity for semiconductor-grade sulfuric acid has grown to 320,000 tons from 280,000 tons.
Its renewable energy business, based in Australia, is also progressing smoothly. Ark Energy, a Korea Zinc subsidiary, was selected as an operator under the New South Wales state government's Long-Term Energy Service Agreement for a project to build large-scale solar power and energy storage systems in Australia's Richmond Valley, and has since secured grid connection approval. The first phase of Bowmans Creek, a 335-megawatt wind power project, also won federal environmental impact assessment approval and signed an LTESA with the state government.
The expansion of these new businesses is expected to translate into solid earnings growth. Korea Zinc posted consolidated revenue of 12.4446 trillion won and operating profit of 1.3332 trillion won in the first half of this year, its best half-year performance on record. Securities analysts say that while short-term volatility remains tied to variables such as precious metal prices and exchange rates, earnings strength will grow more robust as the company reinforces its high-margin non-ferrous metals portfolio and new businesses begin generating profits in earnest.
