The analysis of cemented carbide industry demand status and trend in development in 2018

Cemented carbide is an alloy material made of refractory metal rigid compounds and bonded metals through powder metallurgy process, mainly used in cutting tools, stamping tools, molds, mining and road construction machinery and other fields. According to data projections in recent years, the main consumer industries of cemented carbide are still cutting tools.

Cemented carbide is mainly used in cutting tools, mining tools, molds and high pressure high temperature dump cavity, among which the proportion of cutting tools and mining tools accounted for 33% and 25% of cemented carbide applications, respectively. In cutting tools, cemented carbide is mainly used as tool materials, such as knives, milling cutters, planer, drill bits, boring knives, etc., for cutting cast iron, non-ferrous metals, plastics, chemical fiber, graphite, glass, stone and ordinary steel, as well as difficult to process materials, cutting processing is mainly based on machine tools to achieve. In terms of mining tools, cemented carbide plays an important role in minerals, oil extraction and infrastructure construction, mainly as rock drilling tools, mining tools and drilling tools. 

Demand for cemented carbide in the field of cutting tools 

Cutting tool downstream application is very extensive, at present, the domestic cutting tool products have a greater demand for key customers are: Automotive industry enterprises, aviation, aerospace, weapons, ships, nuclear industry and other ten industrial groups, machinery, railway locomotives, molds, textiles, energy equipment, agricultural machinery, major sets of equipment manufacturing enterprises.      

According to statistics, the world's cutting tool demand, general machinery and automobile manufacturing accounted for about 35%, aerospace accounted for about 10%. In recent years, the demand for cemented carbide in Chinese cutting tools has increased year by year. In 2016, the demand for cemented carbide in cutting tools was about 9686 tons, an increase of 4.15% over the previous year.             

Demand is expected to exceed the 10,000-ton mark in 2017. According to national planning, by 2020 China will become a car, large aircraft, ships, electronic components, integrated circuits, high-grade CNC machine tools and other key complete sets of equipment and advanced scientific equipment manufacturing base, all of which will greatly enhance the demand for cutting tools. Prospective estimates, by 2023, the demand for carbide cutting tools will reach about 13600 tons.

Demand for cemented carbide in the field of geological mine tool

In recent years, China's geology and mining industry has developed rapidly, thus driving the demand for geological mining tools industry, geological mining tool cemented carbide demand is also increasing, 2016 geological mining tools industry cemented carbide demand of about 7512 tons, an increase of 4.39% year-on-year. Demand is expected to grow to around 8000 tons in 2017. 

With the advancement of coal mine integration, it is bound to produce a lot of demand for mine tools. Other minerals, the Ministry of Land and Resources issued the "National Mineral Resources Planning (2016-2020)" clearly stated that, at present, China is still in the middle stage of industrialization, energy resource demand growth rate is slowing down, but the total demand will still maintain a high operation, it is expected that by 2020, China's primary energy consumption of about 5 billion tons of standard coal, Iron ore 750 million tons of ore, refined copper 13.5 million tons, the original aluminum 35 million tons. Influenced by the international mining market, domestic survey investment tends to fall downwards, but in general, China's demand for mineral resources is increasing, but domestic mining is in a downward trend, before the low-yield and crude collection model will gradually be replaced by high-capacity mining model, and the demand for high-quality mining tools will be greater. Prospective Industrial Research Institute predicts that by 2023, the demand for cemented carbide from geological mining tools will reach about 10,000 tons.

The above data and analysis are from the prospective Industrial Research Institute issued by the "2018-2023 China cemented carbide industry market foresight and investment strategic Planning analysis report."