Good day, ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for joining us for this Energy Fuels proposed acquisition of VAC. As a reminder, all phone lines are in a muted or listen-only mode to prevent background noise, later you will have the opportunity to ask questions during our question and answer session. To signal for a question during that time, simply press the star followed by the digit one on your telephone keypad. If you need operator assistance today, simply press star and zero. To get us started with opening remarks and introductions, it is my pleasure to turn the floor over to President and CEO, Mr. Ross Bhappu. Welcome, sir.
Thank you, Jim, thank you, everybody, for joining us today. We have some really exciting news to talk about, I'm excited to be here with Erik Eschen. Actually, Erik is in Germany, he's joining me online, we'll be making a presentation together to tell you about this great news. If we flip to slide four. First of all, just want to, again, thank everybody for joining. Today marks a very important milestone for Energy Fuels and rare earth supply chain security. With the acquisition of Vacuumschmelze, also known as VAC, we're realizing our vision to become the only really true Western mine-to-magnet platform. This culmination of years of effort to build a world-class portfolio of upstream, midstream, and downstream mining assets that comprise a unique, vertically integrated rare supply chain.
I'm now going to walk you through how all these pieces fit together, starting with the VAC transaction. Just starting on page five. VAC is a leading advanced magnetics company headquartered in Hanau, Germany. This transaction, coming on the heels of our planned acquisition of ASM, puts us on a path to create a fully integrated mine-to-magnet rare earth platform, combining Energy Fuels' low-cost upstream rare earth element mining projects and existing separation capabilities with VAC's world-class downstream rare earth magnet manufacturing expertise. Together, we will be in a better position to serve customers across North AmErika, Europe, and high-growth sectors, including the automotive, aerospace, defense, robotics, data centers, electronics, and industrial automation sectors. The cash and stock consideration for the company includes $718 million in cash and 65.85 million shares.
Based on Energy Fuels' closing share price of $16.12 as of Monday, June 22nd, the transaction implies an equity value for VAC of approximately $1.9 billion. The transaction's been unanimously approved by the Energy Fuels board of directors, we expect the transaction to close in early 2027, subject, of course, to customary closing conditions, including the receipt of applicable, excuse me, regulatory and government approvals. Accounting for the planned completion of the ASM acquisition, Ara Partners is expected to own roughly 19.9% of Energy Fuels following the closing of the VAC transaction. The stock element of the transaction keeps ARA invested in the long-term value creation opportunity of the combined company. ARA will have the right to appoint one director to the Energy Fuels board and will be subject to customary lock-up and standstill restrictions.
The acquisition of VAC will be immediately accretive to our earnings and cash flow, and VAC's legacy business generated $27 million of adjusted EBITDA in 2025 and has experienced more than 20% year-over-year growth in its order book for 2026. VAC Sumter Facility is expected to generate approximately between $65 million and $75 million worth of annual run rate EBITDA once its production reaches its current capacity of 2,000 tons per annum. VAC is the only commercial European and U.S. permanent magnet producer that is operating magnetic facilities in North AmErika, Europe, and Asia, with a commercial spectrum of relevant customer-qualified neodymium-iron-boron and samarium cobalt magnet grades, including energy-dense, high coercivity magnets required for mission-critical defense and aerospace applications. If we turn to the next slide, we will talk a little bit about what VAC is. VAC has more than 100 years of production expertise.
It has over 400 patents and more than 1,000 long-term customers globally. Over the last decade, VAC has produced and shipped more than 1 billion, let me repeat that, 1 billion rare earth permanent magnets. VAC employs approximately 4,000 people across several locations. These facilities include Hanau, Germany; Jyväskylä, Finland; Horná Streda, Slovakia; and Sumter, South Carolina. VAC's state-of-the-art Sumter, South Carolina facility, the largest permanent magnet plant of scale in the United States, is constructed, and it is able to produce 2,000 tons per annum of neodymium-iron-boron magnet block and has a pathway to scale up to 12,000 tons per annum. Moving to the next slide. There continues to be a surge in demand for neodymium-iron-boron magnets in North AmErika and Europe, and we expect it to grow by over 50% over the next decade based on estimates from the International Energy Agency.
Bridging the Western supply gap requires significant investment, including more than $60 billion by 2035. That supply gap is concentrated in the most technically challenging and underinvested parts of the value chain, which is exactly where VAC adds critical downstream capability. Next slide. Let me explain why we have opted for the acquisition to create this Western mine-to-magnet platform and what that market is looking for. We see strong evidence that buying gets us to where we want to faster and with more capability compared to our peers. Energy Fuels has built a strong foundation across rare earth feedstock, processing, and separation, with planned metals and alloys capabilities being added through the ASM acquisition. Strategically, this transaction is about accelerating the rare earth value chain we have already been building over the past several years.
The VAC transaction paves the way for us to become the only company with geographically diversified commercial capabilities across every critical step of the rare earth value chain. It also expands Energy Fuels' participation in higher value downstream markets where customer relationships, technical capabilities, and supply chain reliability are increasingly important. I would now like to hand the floor over to Erik Eschen, CEO of VAC, who will discuss VAC's established platform, customer relationships, and differentiated capabilities. Erik?
Hey, thanks, Ross. It's very exciting to be here with you and present this outstanding deal. Quickly, my name is Erik Eschen. I'm the CEO of VAC. I'm with the company for 10 years now and happy to provide a little bit of background information what we are doing. VAC is more than 100-year-old company with a lot of experience in producing soft magnetic materials and permanent magnets. We have about 1,000 customers where most of our products are specced in, which means we develop it with them. It's very sticky to these customers. At the same time, we are highly innovative. More than 20% of our revenue is usually with products we just implemented into the market the last couple of years. Also, for that, we have an outstanding relationship with our customers, on average more than 30 years, some of them 100.
Also saying that, we have a lot of startups because we have the full mix of whoever is in the innovative world works with us. Most important, we are the only producer, as Ross already mentioned, on permanent magnets in the Western world. Saying that, we are fully DFARS compliant and we serve the military in the U.S. and obviously with the allies for many, many decades and have a significant differentiated IP portfolio. How do we manage our business? Because with our revenue of nearly $400 million, we are quite diverse. We separate in soft and hard magnetic magnets, and hard magnetic magnets, these are our permanent ones. At the moment, this is our smaller business. As Ross stated, with a lot of demand out there.
If you look at our financials, we make a gross margin of $68 million and EBITDA of $28 million as we speak, with whatever we discussed before. On the R&D side, I think that's very essential for the deal as well. Everyone was looking into that. We have 150+ FTEs in our R&D. We have 420+ patents. A lot of process IP, and we serve with that the high-end markets. Automotive, it's not only EV, but mainly that's where we're coming from. The whole automotive industry, we are very strong. Aerospace and defense and drones, the solar industry for our soft magnetic market. On the permanent magnet market, we have a lot of requests and demand and customers in the robotic sector, aerospace defense.
Data centers, obviously, is one of the major industries right now, and also the whole automotive industries, as I said before, on both sides, on the electric, as on the combustion engine. If we take a look at the following slide, and this is the most exciting or very exciting part that also I'm pretty sure Ross was attracted right from the beginning. We just completed our facility in Sumter, South Carolina. I'm on page 10 now. We got asked a couple of years ago to build a facility on U.S. soil. We just completed that in a very short timeframe. It was outstanding what the team could achieve. We are fully commissioned and in production. We are in Sumter, South Carolina. It's close to the Shaw Air Base, whoever is familiar with that area.
We can, at the moment, produce 2,000 tons per annum on block material. We designed the factory that we can very quickly expand the capacity to 4,000 tons without interruption of the current production. We already thought ahead when we designed the first phase, and we can easily expand to 12,000 tons. We have secured the space around and are ready to go that route over the next couple of years. In the deal together also with Energy Fuels and also with ASM, we are ready and want to integrate the value chain steps before, especially metal making and strip casting, where ASM has great experience and we are so excited to work together. We are waiting, obviously, to get the material from Energy Fuels. We can fill the whole facility with the materials we will get out of Energy Fuels.
You can see the growth potential with the expansion of that sector in Sumter, South Carolina. Yeah, we are just excited, the whole team. It's just here, and we are looking forward to work with Energy Fuels very, very close and happy to have you, Ross, and your team. I hand it over back to you.
Oh, thank you, Erik. We're very excited to be working together with you as well. This combination brings together very highly complementary capabilities across the value chain, and it pairs Energy Fuels' upstream and midstream rare earth platform with VAC's downstream magnet manufacturing expertise. VAC's Sumter Facility will be the end destination for the feedstock produced across Energy Fuels' integrated supply chain. In its first phase, The Donald Project in Australia will produce monazite that's expected to be processed into separated rare earth oxides at Energy Fuels' existing processing circuits, existing at the White Mesa Mill in Utah, just outside of Blanding, Utah. That's where upgrades are expected to be completed by the end of 2027.
The separated oxides are expected to be converted into rare earth metals and alloys at the Korean Metals Plant, part of the ASM acquisition. These in turn, will be used to make permanent magnets at the Sumter Facility. Energy Fuels' planned phase two expansion at the White Mesa Mill is expected to increase the mill's separation capacity up to 5,200 tons per annum of NdPr oxide and approximately 240 tons per annum of dysprosium and 70 tons per annum of terbium oxide by mid-2029. Energy Fuels will feed this expansion with monazite from The Donald Project and Energy Fuels' Vara Mada Project and our Bahia heavy mineral sands projects, which are currently in their permitting and development stages. We'll also feed the mill through market purchases of monazite and mixed rare earth carbonate as required.
Oxides produced as a result of the phase two separation capacity are expected to be converted into rare earth metals and alloys at the Korean Metals Plant and the American Metals Plant, both of which facilities are expected to be expanded. The mill's phase two expansion is expected to provide more than enough rare earth alloys to support a full 12,000 tons per annum scale up at Sumter, as well as VAC's current European rare earth permanent magnet facilities, subject, of course, to demand for the permanent magnets. By integrating feedstock, separated oxides, metals and alloys, and finished magnets, we see opportunities to improve the value supply chain security, capture more of the value across the rare earth value chain, and strengthen structural margins over time. Next slide.
We see a significant customer opportunity with over $2 billion of annual customer revenue pipeline that can support Sumter's expansion case over time. The value creation opportunity comes from vertical integration, customer access, margin capture, supply chain security, and participation in higher value downstream segments of the rare earth market. VAC's permanent magnet customer pipeline includes EV and non-EV automotive applications, data centers, power tools, robotics, aerospace and defense, semiconductors, and other industrial applications. By combining Energy Fuels' upstream and midstream rare earth capabilities with VAC's downstream magnet manufacturing platform, we can capture more of the margin across the value chain. Vertical integration gives us the opportunity to eliminate third-party markups, internalize input costs, and create a more structurally advantaged cost position over time. It also gives the combined company greater flexibility to serve customers at variable points, multiple points in the value chain.
That includes oxides, metals and alloys, or finished magnets, depending on customer needs. For customers, that means a more complete supply chain solution supported by secure feedstock, Western production capabilities, and DFARS compliant production. For Energy Fuels shareholders, the transaction creates a clear path to margin uplift and long-term value creation as Energy Fuels captures more economics across the entire value chain, and that includes both rare earth and magnet supply chain. On slide 14, the combined company brings together operating assets, developing projects, and long-term expansion opportunities across rare earths, uranium, and critical minerals. VAC adds immediate downstream scale and customer access to Energy Fuels' existing upstream and midstream platform. Energy Fuels' feedstock and processing capabilities help de-risk VAC's supply chain, while VAC's magnetic expertise helps accelerate monetization of Energy Fuels' rare earth production.
The result is a broader, more balanced growth profile with assets at multiple stages of maturity and multiple paths to long-term value. Now I'd like to walk through the intended pro forma of the company, the growth initiatives, which we expect to be supported by government funding that's existing, conditionally committed, and in discussion across the U.S. and Australia. As we announced last week, Energy Fuels has received a conditional commitment for up to $725 million from the U.S. Office of Strategic Capital in the form of a 20-year loan to accelerate the planned expansion at the White Mesa Mill and construction of the American Metals Plant.
Energy Fuels and its joint venture partner, Astron, are also making progress on discussions regarding an AUD 220 million lending package to support the development of phase one of the Donald Project from Export Finance Australia. In addition, VAC has received $220 million in total funding to support the scale-up of Sumter. VAC government and project-level support is expected to help de-risk capital deployment and support execution across key growth projects, including White Mesa, Donald, the Korean Metals Plant, and Sumter. Now let's talk about the value to shareholders. The benefits of the long-term growth, innovation, and value creation catalyzed by the acquisition of VAC will be experienced by all our key stakeholders. For Energy Fuels stakeholders, shareholders, the transaction creates exposure to fully integrated Western mine-to-magnet platform with significant value creation potential through an enhanced margin capture and downstream growth.
For our customers, the combined company enhances product capabilities, supports more resilient Western supply chains, and provides DFARS-compliant production. The combined company will also be better positioned to serve as a secure and trusted supplier of critical rare earth materials and magnets, supporting customers whose supply chains are increasingly tied to national security, industrial competitiveness, and resilience. VAC will retain its branding and historic identity. Recall, it's been in business for over 100 years. With its technology-based engineering expertise and manufacturing footprint remaining critical to the success of the combined company. Our focus now is on completing the transaction, engaging constructively with regulators and stakeholders, continuing to advance our broader, rarer strategy. I'd like to close by summarizing where this transaction positions us.
We're creating a fully integrated mine-to-magnet rare earth platform, combining Energy Fuels' low-cost, upstream rare earth mining projects and existing separation capabilities with VAC's world-class downstream rare earth magnet manufacturing expertise. The acquisition results in a significant margin uplift and long-term value creation as Energy Fuels captures more economics across the rare earth and magnet supply chain. We will be better positioned to serve customers across North AmErika and Europe in high-growth sectors. We will win market share by offering a more complete supply chain solution supported by secure feedstock, Western production capabilities, and DFARS-compliant production. The combined company growth plan is expected to be supported by government funding that's secured, conditionally committed, and in discussion across the U.S. and Australia. We're very excited about the opportunities ahead and confident in the long-term potential of the combined company.
With that, I'd like to open the floor up to questions that you might have. I'm going to turn it back to Jim for pulling questions.
Happy to. To our audience joining this morning, at this time, if you would like to ask a question, simply press star followed by the digit one on your telephone keypad. Pressing star and one will place your line into a queue, and I will open your lines individually. Also, a friendly reminder that if you're joining today on a speakerphone, please return to your handset to be certain that your signal does reach our equipment. That is star and one for questions, everyone. We'll hear first from Nick Giles at B. Riley Securities,
Yes. Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone. Ross and Erik, congrats to you and your team on this transformative deal here. Maybe just on the first side, touching on VAC's growth, I was wondering, Erik, if you could just walk us through the CapEx for phase two, what kind of savings would you see just given the kind of front-loaded investment, and then how should we think about CapEx ultimately to that 12,000 mark? Thank you.
Ross, should I take it immediately or you want to start?
No, go ahead, Erik.
Obviously, we built our phase one in record time with a CapEx of half a billion. We assume there will be some savings for phase two for two reasons. First, some of the infrastructure is already there. We don't have to start from scratch. We also, even we have been close to perfection, we learned a little bit out of phase 1 like you do on every project. I'm sure the team will get better out of that. In that range, -10% to -20% for each 2,000 is a ballpark, I would assume. Saying that, if we further build immediately from, not stepwise, but a facility by 4,000, you can have another discount on the overall CapEx. That's how I would see it, and would do my calculation on that.
Thanks, Erik. Nick, I hope that answered your question, good to talk to you.
Yeah, no, sorry if I don't have it in front of me. Just what would be the gross dollar amount just on that basis for ultimately reaching phase 2?
Erik, I don't know if we've published that number. I don't believe we have.
For phase one, it is all a little bit forward-looking, so a little bit more careful. 2,000 tons, depending then on the final magnet, because not every magnet is the same, you can assume $250 million-$400 million, depending on the complexity of the magnet, with a very healthy margin as you have seen in the presentation. You can make the math. The payback period is pretty attractive. What we usually do, we are looking for firm contracts for a period also to secure the investment.
Understood. Ross, I wanted to really just ask you about capital allocation on the back of this deal. You have a nice bit of cash on the balance sheet, some of that, or the majority of that will go towards the deal here. Just how do you think about capital allocation to your other growth projects, and what do you think about funding needs from here?
Look, I think the government support that we announced last week has a huge impact on our cash position, on our funding capabilities. Clearly, we are using a fair bit of our cash to get this deal done. We are exploring how to, I guess, explore other alternatives for funding the rest of our activities. Nick, we've got, as you know, the White Mesa mill feasibility study came in lower than we had anticipated. We've got our phase one expansion going on. I think we're in good shape, we've also put in place a loan from Goldman Sachs that will help support our cash flow, and that's a term loan. I think we're in good shape to manage our cash and our capital requirements.
Understood. Well, very helpful. I'll jump back in the queue for now, congratulations again.
Thanks, Nick. Appreciate that.
We'll move next to Noel Parks at Tuohy Brothers. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, good morning. I guess with Energy Fuels doing this transaction at this particular time, I wonder if you could just sort of talk about your assessment of sort of the risk-reward of this additional step in vertical integration. I'm thinking about, it does represent additional operational complexity for the parent company. I assume that was somewhat balanced against your faith in rare earths market and sort of the ability to seize the critical minerals moment. If you could just sort of talk about how you assess that and how that affects the timing.
Sure, Noel, and thanks for the question. Look, I think from a risk-reward perspective, we chose VAC because it's existing, because it has over 1,000 existing customers. It is an operating company. It's been in operation for 100 years. From a risk perspective, we're not developing new technologies. We're not building a new plant. They've already got existing facilities in place. We think it's the lowest risk way for us to vertically integrate. It's a tremendous opportunity for us. The fact that Ara chose to work with Energy Fuels, we chose to work with them and acquire this company, I think is sort of a testament because there were certainly other suitors. I don't know specifics about that, but I'm sure there were other suitors for VAC.
I think this is just a tremendous match between the two companies and the lowest risk way for us to get into the magnet business as opposed to trying to develop the path on our own.
Got it. If you could just sort of talk about where the ASM piece and the Korea processing sort of fits into the puzzle. I'm just curious, I guess, first of all, would VAC have made sense without the ASM piece? I'm just wondering if you foresee a real opportunity of being able to arbitrage cost structures in the marketplace now that you have these different-- with your various monazite sources and rare earth sources long term. Is that a big piece of it, or does it really just boil down to the efficiency and the customer opportunities?
Well, look, I think, the acquisitions of both companies provide this full vertical integration. I think that had we not acquired or been in the process of acquiring the Australian entity, I think we would want to get into metal and alloy making regardless, because that's a missing piece of the value creation matrix. Having the full vertical integration, I think, is vitally important. Would we have done VAC without him? I think of course, we would have certainly thought about that. I think not being reliant on a third party to supply metals and alloys gives us a tremendous leg up on anybody else operating in this space. I do think it's just that whole vertical integration makes incredible sense.
Great. Thanks a lot.
Thank you.
Again, to our phone audience today, that is star and one, if you'd like to ask a question. We'll move to Joseph Reagor at Roth Capital.
Thanks. Hey, Ross. Thanks for taking the questions. I guess my first question is just on VAC. What was their production rate last year that resulted in the $29 million of EBITDA?
Yeah, I'm not sure that's been publicly disclosed. Does anyone here know?
No.
We haven't disclosed that amount.
Yeah. By the way, we don't have a production rate because we have facilities and so many different products. There's not one production rate, so nothing to disclose on that end. Just like Ross said.
Okay. Fair enough. Then, Ross, should we expect Energy Fuels immediately post-closing on this transaction to provide investor guidance on what you guys expect revenue run rates and EBITDA margins to look like on the combined business?
Yeah, we have put out guidance in the past. We will continue to put out guidance. I got to tell you, it's not my favorite thing to do because we're in this massive growth phase. We've got all these exciting things happening, and it's hard to judge us quarter to quarter, but we will certainly do that. I think the long-term value creation is where people need to be focused on with Energy Fuels with these acquisitions.
Okay. One other one, if I could. Just on the $1.9 billion valuation, is there any way from Energy Fuels side that you can kind of break down how you guys got to that number as a fair value to acquire it, given EBITDA was only $29 million last year?
Yeah. $29 million last year, historically it's been much higher. The growth profile that we're looking at, and the value that it brings to the combined entity, I think, the calculations were pretty easy to zero in on that sort of number. We worked with our advisors, I know Ara worked with their advisors, jointly we came up with a number that was appropriate for both parties and accretive, certainly, to our shareholders.
Okay. Thanks. I'll turn it over.
Thanks, Joe. Good talking to you.
We'll take a follow-up from Nick Giles once more at B. Riley Securities.
Yeah. Thanks for taking my follow-up. I was just curious, Erik, if you could maybe walk us through your current feedstock. Obviously, it'll be replaced by Energy Fuels at a later date, but if you could just walk us through where you're currently sourcing your metal today.
Yeah. That's a fantastic question. That's why we are so excited. Traditionally, our feedstock for permanent magnets, and I'm only talking about that side of the business, because that's I assume you are referring to. Most of that feedstock traditionally comes out of China. We have a supply chain outside China for 15, 20 years, mainly for military, but also for customers who were asking for that, where we use material from outside. That's a small volume, and this is where the Western world is struggling. The capacities there, from the mines to the midstreams, are not sufficient, and we are the only producer for permanent magnets in the Western world. Therefore, we are excited to get as quickly and as much material out of the mines from Energy Fuels. We will replace that. It's highly cost-efficient as well as competitive.
I think there are great opportunities also from the margin on each and every step there. We will replace as much as possible. In the first years, it's more like how much can we get? At the moment, just to say that and make that clear, we cannot fulfill all the demands, because we need more raw materials, and therefore, for me, it's a merger made in heaven to have Energy Fuels now on our side.
Great. I really appreciate that. Maybe just, there was a slide, a nice slide on kind of your soft magnetics contribution versus that of permanent magnets. I was wondering if you could just touch on the margin profile between both of those segments. How do you ultimately see the margin profile expanding as you go from kind of phase one to phase two and phase two to the 12,000? Thank you.
Yeah. Historically, our margin profile is pretty stable over the two businesses. We have a few points lower margins on permanent magnets. Just recall, we are the only competitor to the Chinese dominance, and therefore, the competition there is very, very strong, but with our innovations we are having on that side, we could make an an attractive margin. On the soft magnetic side, we have a lot of products where we single source. The competition is a little bit less intense, and most of our competitors, by the way, come out of Europe and the U.S., so it's a complete different competitive profile and therefore the margins are a little bit higher. What we see right now is, there's a lot of political efforts in North AmErika, as well as in Europe to Source more out of the western countries. What might change the overall picture?
I'm just with Ross, we haven't calculated it through with the whole process yet, this is what we are going to do the next couple of months and weeks. It's difficult to make predictions. I'm very positive we can further improve there if we are working together.
Great. Just while we have you, I'll sneak in one more, if that's all right. Magnet qualification cycles are not short to my knowledge. How far along is Sumter in that process? How do you kind of see that timeline shrinking or can it shrink as you ramp further and you get more products in the hands of these customers?
That's an outstanding question. We produce these kinds of permanent magnets for more than 40 years when they got innovated. We have all the qualifications you need if you work for automotive, for aerospace and defense. This takes usually years to get. As we are doing it, we are just having that. We could bring our experienced team from Europe to Sumter and actually most of the workers, really the shop floor workers and obviously the whole management team, we trained up to 18 months here in Germany in our facility, brought them over to Sumter, and they are train the trainers. We are fully operational and qualified. That's one of the huge advantages. I think no one in the industry. Wait, not in the industry. Actually, industry observers are not aware.
You are looking on the mines and process technology, this is all key where we are leading and most of our technology we installed in Sumter, we changed and developed ourselves. That's why we are still here and the others all failed against the Chinese competition. By the way, we never made a loss in permanent magnets over the last 40 years. I just want to state that here as well. Getting these qualifications, this is completely overseen by everyone. It's pretty harsh, because you have to produce for months, if not years, to get qualified. We have it. Just imagine, you cannot send a magnet into a fighter jet or into a commercial plane if you are not fully compliant with all the regulations.
They are audited, they are tested, they are tough to get, as you can imagine, it takes ages to get them. Just to repeat once more, we are already there.
Fantastic call. Erik, Ross, I appreciate you taking all my questions, continue. Best of luck.
Thank you, Nick. I appreciate the questions.
To be certain that our phone audience today has had the opportunity to signal, we will pause for just an additional moment to allow signals with star and one if you have a question or a comment today. We have no signals from our audience remaining. Mr. Bhappu, I'm happy to turn it back to you, sir, for any additional or closing remarks that you have.
Thanks, Jim. I appreciate that. Look, I want to just reiterate that this is a transformational acquisition and merger for Energy Fuels. It's extremely value accretive, just in a long-term strategic position for our shareholders and for our company. This is going to allow us to capture margin across all stages of production, and I can't overstate the value of that. What we're taking on with VAC is a very dedicated workforce, very capable workforce. Energy Fuels has the same. We have a dedicated, very successful and extremely valuable workforce, and I can't help but think that combining the two is going to be extremely valuable. I can't overstate the value of acquiring the capability that VAC has. As Erik just mentioned, developing this capability organically is extremely challenging.
You can't just start a magnet manufacturing facility and get qualified and get your magnets into production at the OEMs or defense contractors overnight. It's a long process. That's what really drove us to the attraction of this partnership with VAC. Just, I want to close by saying we're extremely excited about this acquisition. I think this combination is extremely powerful. It should make us the most valuable rare earth company outside of China, and I'm very confident when I say that. Thank you everybody for listening. We're excited about this and look forward to answering more questions in the future. Thank you, Jim.
Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's Energy Fuels Inc. conference call. Thank you all for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines. We hope that you enjoy the rest of your day.