Switch Metals
The wash plant has done its job. Now we wait.
When I last updated you on Switch Metals in February, I said the next few weeks would be key.
The maiden Mineral Resource Estimate was the prize — the moment the market would finally get hard numbers to put against the story.
We’re nearly there.
But first, for those who need a reminder of why this matters.
The Bigger Picture
We are living through a fundamental restructuring of global critical metals supply chains.
Governments, corporations, and defence contractors across the Western world have woken up to an uncomfortable reality: the materials that make modern technology function are overwhelmingly sourced from places that are either geopolitically unreliable, strategically adversarial or ethically compromised.
Tantalum sits right at the heart of this problem.
It’s in your phone, your laptop, your car’s electronics and the guidance systems of military hardware. It cannot easily be substituted.
And somewhere between 60-70% of global supply comes from artisanal mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo — a supply chain so compromised that in December 2024, the DRC filed criminal complaints against Apple in European courts over alleged conflict minerals.
ESG and traceability requirements are moving from voluntary commitments to legal and commercial obligations. Western technology and defence companies need alternative sources — not eventually. Now.
Meanwhile, the supply picture is tightening further. Recent mine closures in Australia have removed substantial production capacity. And tantalum prices are rising - fast.
As a reminder, tantalum processing remains controlled by the United States, Germany, and Japan — not China — which makes it a genuine strategic priority in the current geopolitical environment.
This is the gap Switch Metals is building to fill.
Côte d’Ivoire is a stable, mining-friendly jurisdiction.
The Issia project sits on a 1,015 km² district-scale land package covering a highly prospective pegmatite corridor. The development strategy is simple and capital-light: mine the shallow placer deposits first using gravity separation, generate cash flow, then use that cash to fund deeper hard rock development.
Capital requirement for Phase 1 is just $5 million — modest by mining standards. At current tantalum prices, projected annual revenue could exceed $25 million with cash margins of around 50-70%.
We’ve also had a lithium discovery — spodumene-bearing pegmatites grading between 1.00% and 2.58% Li₂O — sitting co-located with the tantalum. The same geological system, the same pegmatite corridor, delivering two critical metals at once.
Switch’s neighbours at Tiassalé include Atlantic Lithium and a Ganfeng joint venture. Leo Lithium’s Goulamina project in neighbouring Mali sold to Ganfeng entirely.
The geological pedigree of the region is established.
Switch now has optionality across tantalum, lithium, and niobium from a single stable jurisdiction, backed by Xcelsior Capital and Wogen Resources — a specialist critical metals financier and a $400 million+ annual turnover physical commodities trader respectively — who took equity exposure through warrants rather than just advisory fees.
Yes, the stock has sold off slightly, but this is a hiccup in the grand scheme of rises.
Because the resource washing programme at Issia is complete. On time and within budget. Again.
Every one of those 400-plus tonnes of soil material collected across the 369-pit programme has now been processed through the pilot wash plant. The field work is done. The samples are in the lab. The geological modelling is running in parallel.
MRE-1 — focused on the eluvial and colluvial targets that have been the primary focus since day one — is now weeks away.
As a reminder, Switch has laid out a three-stage resource definition strategy:
MRE-1: The initial resource, covering the eluvial and colluvial targets
MRE-2: An incremental update bringing in additional eluvial and colluvial targets
MRE-3: A further update incorporating the 28 priority alluvial drainage basins identified in February
This matters. Most small explorers publish one resource estimate and let the market figure out the rest. Switch is essentially pre-announcing that MRE-1 is just the opening bid. The alluvial targets — that additional 7 km² of prospective drainage basins sitting within a 112 km² licence, within a 1,015 km² district — come later.
Arethuse Geology — the same independent firm that produced the Competent Person’s Report at IPO — has been engaged to produce the MRE.
The number that matters when MRE-1 lands is grade and tonnage against what’s needed to support Phase 1 economics — roughly 100 tonnes of annual tantalum production from a $5 million capital base, targeting $25 million in annual revenue at current prices.
If the resource supports that, the conversation shifts from exploration to development. Mining licence application, feasibility study, financing — all of it becomes live.
The Bottom Line
Six months ago Switch was a promising story with a compelling thesis and a management team that talked the right game.
Today it’s a story where the field work is finished, the independent lab is running assays, the geological model is being built, a lithium discovery has added a free option on a second critical metal, and a specialist financier with a track record of ten-bagger returns has taken exposure.
The market now values this at roughly £13 million.
Or six months of future revenue.
That’s about to be tested against actual numbers.