Nippon Mining & Metals to Expand Philippine Electrolytic Copper Foil

Nippon Mining & Metals will expand the output capacity of electrolytic copper foil by 18% at the Philippine operation. The investment is estimated to be around 2-3 billion yen. The firm tries to ship the half of the expanded output to Japanese users under strong demand for printed circuit board of automobile application when the firm’s Japanese operation has limited room for expansion. The firm tries to expand the copper foil business including new products for lithium ion battery and expansion of rolled copper foil. The firm expands the electrolytic copper foil output capacity by 150 tonnes to monthly 1,000 tonnes from current 800-900 tonnes at Nikko Materials Philippines. The firm expands foil making facility and surface treatment facility to launch in January 2009 pumping up full capacity operation in April. Nippon Mining & Metals produces monthly 700 tonnes of electrolytic copper foil at Shirogane plant in Ibaraki. The plant with monthly 1,000 tonnes of capacity cannot increase the output when the plant shifts to thinner products to 18 or 12 micrometers thick from 35 micrometers before. The firm tries to increase the shipment for Japanese users through the expansion in Philippines when the firm cannot meet the strong demand in Japan. The firm plans to ship a third or half of expanded foil output at Philippines to Japanese users.