News Article
5N Plus Inc. and Teck Metals Ltd. enter into supply agreements for Germanium and indium feedstock
5N Plus Inc. (TSX:VNP), a leading producer and provider of high-purity metals and compounds for electronic applications, is pleased to announce that its wholly-owned subsidiary Firebird Technologies Inc. (“Firebird”) has entered into long-term supply agreements for germanium and indium feedstocks with Teck Metals Ltd. (“Teck”), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Teck Resources Ltd. (TSX: TCK.A and TCK.B, NYSE: TCK), a world-leading producer of base metals and minor metals.
Under the terms of these agreements, Teck will provide a long term stable supply to Firebird of germanium and indium feedstocks which are to be further processed by Firebird into value-added products.
5N Plus President and Chief Executive Officer Jacques L'Écuyer said, “We are pleased to report that these important agreements have been signed, which follows the memorandum of understanding with Teck that we announced in December 2009. Supply of these critical feedstocks will provide our subsidiary Firebird with the required precursors for its value-added products, which are to include semiconductor wafers, semi-finished optics and high-purity metals and compounds. Teck is one of the most important producers of indium and germanium worldwide and we expect the stability of Firebird’s supply chain to be viewed as a differentiating asset by our customers.”
About 5N Plus Inc.
5N Plus draws its name from the purity of its products, 99.999% (five nines or 5N) and more. 5N Plus, which has its head office in Montreal, Québec, develops and produces high-purity metals and compounds for electronic applications and provides its customers with recycling solutions. The Company is an integrated producer with both primary and secondary refining capabilities. 5N Plus focuses on specialty metals such as tellurium, cadmium and selenium and on related compounds such as cadmium telluride and cadmium sulphide. The Company’s products are critical precursors in a number of electronic applications, including the rapidly-expanding solar (thin-film photovoltaic) market, for which 5N Plus is a major supplier of cadmium telluride, and the radiation detector and thermoelectric markets.
