Detaillierte Nahaufnahme einer schwarzen Asphaltoberfläche mit feiner Körnung und rauer Textur bei Tageslicht

When raw materials run short or become unaffordable, industry starts to falter

It does not start with a standstill. Not with a machine that suddenly fails. Not with an order that disappears overnight. It starts more quietly. With prices that multiply in a short time. With raw materials that are still available, but no longer reliably so. With an uncertainty that runs through purchasing, costing and production.

This is exactly the development that can be observed with tungsten carbide.

For many people, the raw material remains invisible. In everyday life, nobody sees the tungsten carbide in the background. What is visible are only the products that are used as a matter of course: laptops, smartphones, medical technology, industrial tools. For industry itself, things look different. There, tungsten carbide is not a side issue, but a basis for long tool life thanks to high hardness and wear resistance. That is precisely why its scarcity is becoming a problem that extends far beyond individual companies. In the EU, tungsten is classified as a critical raw material. At the same time, the European raw materials strategy shows how important the expansion of extraction, processing and recycling has become.

How concrete this issue has become is also shown by the Plusminus report by the German broadcaster BR, which featured NADLER Hartmetalle from Odelzhausen in Bavaria as an example. It makes visible what many industrial companies have long been feeling: raw material shortages are no longer a distant scenario. They have arrived in the reality of production.

Mehrere Wolframkarbid-Hartmetallstifte stehen in Reihen auf schwarzem Untergrund, metallisch glänzend und präzise gefertigt.

Why tungsten carbide is so important for industry and carbide manufacturing

Tungsten carbide is needed wherever materials have to withstand extreme loads. The raw material is used in high-performance applications, for example in tools, in electronics, in medical technology, in food production and in aerospace. Tungsten is of central importance for carbide because it is used to produce tungsten carbide, which is decisive for hardness, dimensional accuracy and tool life.

Carbide manufacturing in particular shows how closely material quality and industrial reliability are linked. The material basis is the starting point of all quality. It helps determine how resilient a component is, how precisely it can be machined and how reliably processes can be secured. If a raw material such as tungsten becomes scarcer, more expensive and harder to calculate, far more changes than just the purchasing situation.

Rising tungsten prices put companies under financial pressure

The real explosiveness does not only show when material is completely unavailable. Even massive price movements put companies under pressure. In the Plusminus report, Wolfgang Nadler describes very clearly how much the situation has escalated:

“We are now at more than three times the 2025 price. In terms of liquidity, that is dramatic for us.”
And further: “At the moment, I don't know where I will get the money for the sums we then have to raise.”

This is where the real force of such raw material crises lies. Orders may be there. Demand may be right. Know-how, machines and staff are in place. But if an indispensable raw material becomes extremely expensive within a short time, the risk shifts directly to financing and to the predictability of the entire business.
This is particularly tricky for medium-sized companies. Unlike large corporations, they cannot cushion such jumps at will. They hit purchasing, warehousing, costing and delivery responsibility directly.

Tungsten from China: why Europe's dependence on raw materials is becoming a problem

A key reason for the tense situation lies in the global market structure. A large part of the processing capacity for tungsten is located in China. It is precisely this concentration that makes the market vulnerable.

If export controls, licensing requirements or political tensions are added, uncertainty and pressure in the supply chains increase. The German Mineral Resources Agency (DERA) points out that tungsten is currently subject to Chinese export controls for dual-use goods.

This reveals a problem that goes far beyond individual price movements. As long as Europe remains highly dependent on a few countries for critical raw materials, political tensions and delays are enough to put entire industries under pressure. The debate about tungsten has therefore long been more than a question of purchasing. It is a question of industrial resilience.

Mehrere graue Wolframkarbid-Pulverstücke in konischer Form liegen auf reflektierender schwarzer Oberfläche

Nahaufnahme von glänzenden Wolframkarbid Körnern auf einem Metalllöffel vor dunklem Hintergrund mit Stoffbeutel

Why raw material shortages hit industrial SMEs particularly hard

Major raw material debates are often conducted politically. In the companies themselves, the situation is much more concrete. There, it is not primarily about strategy papers, but about delivery capability, responsibility towards customers and economic viability.

This is also reflected in Wolfgang Nadler's words from the Plusminus report: “No, I definitely don't sleep well anymore, because you simply worry about the family business and the employees.”
There is more to this sentence than personal strain. It shows how closely raw material supply and entrepreneurial responsibility are linked. When a material market becomes unbalanced, this does not stay in global trade data. It ends up directly in the decisions of family businesses, in the responsibility towards employees and in the question of how reliably manufacturing in Germany can still be planned in the future.

What solutions are there for the tungsten shortage?

The good news is: there are possible solutions. None of them is simple. None of them works overnight. But there are levers that are gaining in importance.

A key approach is recycling. With tungsten in particular, recovering material can help reduce dependencies and strengthen industrial cycles. H.C. Starck Tungsten Powders describes itself as the global leader in recycling tungsten-containing materials and emphasizes that the quality of the recovered raw material matches that of primary material.

The problem, however, is obvious: tungsten scrap is also in demand internationally. If it leaves the European market, it is missing exactly where it would be needed for stable recycling.

A second lever is stockpiling. Strategic stocks cannot prevent shortages, but they can make companies and economies more robust in tense phases. The German Mineral Resources Agency also points this out.

A third approach is the expansion of European raw material projects. This includes stronger support for extraction, more processing capacity and the targeted expansion of recycling structures within Europe. With the Critical Raw Materials Act, the EU aims to strengthen precisely these areas and reduce its dependence on individual supplier countries.

Tungsten shortage is becoming a location issue for industry

What is currently becoming visible in the example of tungsten is, at its core, a question of industrial location. Germany has strong industrial companies, a high depth of production, technical know-how and specialized SMEs. But all of this comes under pressure when the supply of critical raw materials becomes increasingly uncertain.

The current development therefore shows something fundamental: industrial strength depends not only on innovation, machinery and skilled workers. It also depends on how reliably the material basis of production is secured.

The fact that programs such as Plusminus are picking up on this development shows that raw material security has long ceased to be a niche topic. The question of how dependent Germany and Europe are on critical raw materials now touches the core of industrial viability.

Schwarze Industrieabfälle fliegen und liegen auf weißem Hintergrund, dynamische Bewegung und Kontrast sichtbar

NADLER Hartmetalle shows how concrete the tungsten crisis already is

The example of NADLER Hartmetalle in Odelzhausen makes clear how closely material availability, quality, production reliability and economic predictability are interlinked.

For companies that manufacture high-precision custom carbide parts, tungsten is not an abstract value in market statistics. It is a raw material on which everyday industrial reality depends.

That is precisely why the current situation shows how important long-term thinking has become. Raw material security does not only arise once a shortage is already there. It begins with resilient supply chains, functioning recycling structures, political foresight and a realistic view of the vulnerability of European industry.

Why tungsten has long been more than a purchasing issue

When a critical raw material becomes scarce, it does not only affect purchasing. It affects the stability of entire value chains.

Tungsten is a prime example of a development that is increasingly preoccupying many industrial companies in Germany: price pressure, geopolitical dependencies and growing uncertainty in procurement. For SMEs, this quickly becomes a test of endurance, because every price movement, every delay and every new uncertainty is felt immediately.
The Plusminus report has made this problem visible. The real question is no longer whether critical raw materials will become a location issue. They already are.

At NADLER Hartmetalle, the development has been monitored very closely for some time, because the example of tungsten shows particularly clearly how closely the material basis, production reliability and industrial viability are interlinked.

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