Superhard Material Industry in 2013 Reached About Rmb12 Billion in China

Superhard material industry chain mainly involves the following three aspects: monocrystalline superhard materials (including diamond, cubic boron nitride, etc.), composite superhard materials (including clad sheet for cutting tools, clad sheet for oil/gas, clad sheet and wire drawing die blanks used for coal/mining) and super-hard materials and tools (including diamond saw blades, polycrystalline diamond drawing dies and drills, etc.).

In regard of monocrystalline superhard materials, China has become the No.1 producer of synhetic diamonds, generating about 90% of global output. However, due to the sluggish global economy, China's economic slowdown, scant market demand and other factors, in 2013, China's diamond output increased by only 7.9% to 15.1 billion karat.

In point of composite superhard materials, the market size in China in 2013 reached about RMB12 billion, accounting for 21.8% of global total. But influenced by technology and backward process, currently, superhard materials produced by domestic Chinese enterprises are mainly low-end products, while the high-end market is almost monopolized by Element Six, Diamond Innovations, US Synthetic and other foreign manufacturers.

With respect to superhard material tools, China mainly produces diamond saw blades, diamond drill bits, diamond discs and diamond cutting tools, mostly diamond saw blades. In 2013, the market size of diamond saw blades was about RMB 30.5 billion, sharing about 34% of China's total superhard material tool market.

In 2013, affected by the sluggish economy, insufficient demand from downstream petroleum, construction and metal-cutting machine tool industries, superhard material and products industry growth was slowing down; and companies were facing high operating costs. In view of this, Henan Huanghe Whirlwind Co., Ltd, SF Diamond Co., Ltd, BOSUN Tools Co., Ltd and other enterprises all adopted a number of measures to expand their existing production capacity and extend their...