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The metals powering modern technology, like scandium for data centers, gallium for semiconductors, and germanium for fiber optics, all have a problem.
The reality is that the U.S. barely produces those metals domestically anymore.
That’s not a geological problem. But it is an offshoring one. Now, with export restrictions and tariff changes, American manufacturers are facing a critical supply shortage.
“With the unraveling of globalization, supply chain export restrictions, and tit-for-tat tariffs, certain U.S. companies are now finding themselves completely unable to get the metals they need,” says Daniel Rau, founder of Kunin Technologies, a Chattanooga-based mining-focused startup building inside Brickyard.
Kunin’s bet is straightforward: American mines already sit on top of the metals we need. We’re just not pulling them out of the ground.
A New Look At Mining
Traditionally, mining operations are built around one target, be it something like copper or lithium. But the process largely ignores what else is in the rock.
“Ore in the ground contains lower concentrations of these other important metals that we import from China — your gallium, germanium, rhenium, rhodium,” Rau says. Those byproducts don’t get recovered with traditional mining techniques. Across the U.S., that leaves more than $3 trillion in stranded critical minerals, by Kunin’s estimate.
Kunin is building what Rau calls “ion exchange 2.0,” a process that separates metal from mining waste streams. The startup’s redesigned form factor brings the cost down dramatically as it optimizes the processes for speed or rate of metal capture.
“We think every mine can potentially uplift their revenue by about 10 to 30% in 10 years,” Rau says. “We’re helping mines recover a second, third, and fourth metal as byproducts.”
Building In Chattanooga
The six-person Kunin team is based in Chattanooga, which Rau said strategically positions them near Vanderbilt, Georgia Tech, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (which are all hubs for engineering talent). The early-stage company is also tied into Department of Energy projects and is on an active hiring spree.
For Rau, the stakes are high for getting the technology right.
“[Critical mining production] was something we used to lead at,” he told Hypepotamus. Restoring that position, he argues, will require more than incremental improvements to existing processes.
“To restore competitiveness against adversaries or foreign countries that skirt emission standards, regulation, and environmental standards — and which, frankly, have better technology and more mature supply chains — it’s going to take a step function.”
