3D printing is popular, and major material supplier Amaero (AMRO.US) finalizes a $53 million listing clause

The Zhitong Finance App learned that Amaero (AMRO.US), which makes titanium and refractory metal powders and sells 3D printing for defense and aerospace, announced its NASDAQ IPO terms on Tuesday (September 15). The company, headquartered in McDonald, Tennessee, plans to raise $53 million by issuing 7.5 million shares at a hypothetical issue price of $7.06 per share.

The amount of $7.06 was taken from the closing price of its Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) stock (code 3DA) on September 11 at exchange rates; at that issue price, Amaero's fully diluted market capitalization was approximately $221 million. The company plans to list on NASDAQ under the code AMRO, with Stifel and Baird as joint bookkeepers, and pricing is expected on Tuesday, September 22.

Amaero produces refractory metal and titanium alloy spherical powders for additive manufacturing, and also provides large, near-net molded parts manufactured using the powder metallurgy hot isostatic pressing (PM-HIP) process. Its powder products include niobium, tungsten, tantalum, molybdenum, rhenium, and titanium alloys, and are specially designed for 3D printing components in the fields of hypersonic weapon systems, satellite propulsion, strategic missiles, aerospace, and medical. The company was founded in 2013 and achieved revenue of USD 12 million over the 12 months ending June 30, 2026.

This is not a new company. It was founded in Australia in 2013 under the name Amaero Engineering Pty Ltd., and completed the ASX listing in December 2019, with the code 3DA; changed its name to Amaero Ltd in April 2025; then initiated a restructuring in the US — Amaero Inc., established in Delaware on February 20, 2026, and completed the relocation on June 22. The company first submitted the application confidentially on July 10, and officially submitted the S-1 registration documents on August 28. In other words, this NASDAQ offering is a “home exchange” for a company that has been trading on the ASX for nearly seven years, rather than entering the capital market for the first time.

Growing fast, but money is still burning

Financially, Amaero is in a typical “rapid increase in revenue and profit not yet corrected” phase.

The company's revenue for fiscal year 2026 (ending June 30) was $18.1 million, up 376% year over year; of these, revenue for the fourth fiscal quarter set a record record of 7.8 million Australian dollars, an increase of 417% year over year.

The contract backlog for the same period was $23.1 million, equivalent to 128% of revenue for the 2026 fiscal year. There are two landmark events on the order side: the US Department of Defense won a contract of 6.5 million Australian dollars (about 4.5 million US dollars) to replace refractory alloy powder on July 22, covering a period of 13 months to August 2027, focusing on C103 niobium-hafnium-titanium alloy used in hypersonic speed and space propulsion; in April, it signed a minimum titanium powder supply agreement of 7.8 million Australian dollars with an advanced materials customer supported by private equity, and the execution period was from July 2026 to June 2027 — the company said this deal was approximately equal to its 2026 Total sales of titanium powder in fiscal year, and plans to roughly double titanium powder production in fiscal year 2027.

But the profit side is still far away. According to data compiled by Simply Wall St, the company had a net loss of 36.52 million Australian dollars over the past 12 months, gross margin of -26.12%, and a market-sales ratio of about 13.9 times. Another set of data from HDIN Research shows that as of June 30, 2026, the company's common stock was 238.332 million shares, with a cumulative loss of 75.5 million US dollars. The simultaneous expansion of growth and loss is a common characteristic of such material companies during the period when production capacity is climbing.

It's stuck in the tightest part of 3D printing: pink

Metal additive manufacturing has expanded rapidly over the years, but the supply of “qualified powder” has failed to keep up — high-performance titanium powder and refractory powder have historically been produced overseas, leaving US defense and aerospace projects under the double pressure of delivery cycles and export controls for a long time.

It is this gap that Amaero is betting on. Its core platform is electrode induction melting inert gas atomization (EIGA): a “non-contact” aerosol process other than crucible contact melting that can produce high-purity titanium alloys and refractory alloy spherical powders to prevent active, high-melting metals from being contaminated by impurities. According to Pitt Street Research, the yield of spherical titanium powder on the Amaero EIGA Premium platform is about 50%, which is nearly double that of the conventional EIGA process of 25%, and the production cost is about half of the plasma atomization or spheroidization route.

Productivity is the verifiable part. The company's factory in McDonald, Tennessee, has already operated three EIGA atomizers — two for titanium alloy and one for refractory alloys, which together form a titanium alloy powder production capacity of about 480 tons/year and a refractory alloy powder production capacity of about 200 tons/year, totaling about 680 tons/year; the third equipment was put into operation ahead of schedule in August. The three-year, $72 million capital expenditure plan was completed on schedule and on budget, and the company disclosed that it had raised $32.3 million to accelerate the fourth atomizer (with the goal of starting production in June 2027). The company stated that it is the largest domestic supplier of spherical titanium powder and refractory powder with the largest production capacity in the United States. The product line covers grades such as C103 niobium-based powder for rocket engines and hypersonic speeds.

The other leg is PM-HIP: the powder is packed into an airtight container and then high temperature and pressure are applied to directly obtain large, near-clean molded parts with properties similar to those of forgings. For the foundation of the US submarine and maritime industry, this path can bypass lengthy casting and forging queues. The company says it is proceeding with several first-time certification procedures with the Ministry of Defense's main contractor — this is a necessary threshold for moving from samples to batch delivery, and what distinguishes it from a “laboratory company.” The company holds both ISO 9001/AS9100 certification and ITAR registration.

Why now: The popularity of 3D printed materials collides with a policy-driven supply chain

Amaero chose this point to go to the US, and behind that, the entire material chain is heating up.

Refractory metals are the most stringent on the demand side. The caliber given by industry media PowderSight is: the global demand for spherical refractory metal powder for additive manufacturing is expected to reach 21,000 tons, with a year-on-year growth rate of 23.6%; the annual demand for a single hypersonic project can reach hundreds of kilograms, and there are only a few companies with stable supply capacity in the world.

The agency also pointed out that the Asia-Pacific region surpassed North America for the first time this year to become the world's largest metal 3D printing materials market, with the Chinese market accounting for 68% of the total Asia-Pacific market; aerospace contributed about 35% of the revenue of the global metal 3D printing market.

The supply-side logic is driven by policy. The production capacity of titanium sponge in the US is almost zero, and it is highly dependent on imports, while China accounts for about 70% of global titanium sponge production. The Pentagon's local supply chain strategy (DFARS compliance) lists domestic titanium powder and refractory powder as key materials, and “de-risking” continues to increase — this main line directly determines where orders flow.

Peers gave side evidence: ATI's revenue for the latest fiscal quarter was US$1.26 billion, up 11% year on year, adjusted EBITDA increased 37% year over year to US$284 million, order backlog rose to a record high of US$4.4 billion, and the high-end titanium alloy delivery cycle was extended to 20 months; iperionX won the US Army's second SBIR Phase III mission order on August 31, with a base amount of US$18.5 million (of which 11.5 million have already been disbursed, up to US$25.4 million with options included ) is an IDIQ contract with a total cap of 99 million US dollars. The goal is to increase titanium powder production capacity to about 200 tons/year by the end of 2026; 6K Additive's revenue in the first half of the year was 13.27 million US dollars, an increase of 73% over the previous year. Surrounding activities are also intense: Elmet Group signed an agreement to acquire ams OSRAM's tungsten-molybdenum business in Schwaben-Münching, Germany, to establish the first EU production base; Plansee and tungsten miner Almonty extended the Shangdong tungsten ore supply agreement to 21 years; Kennametal launched the first commercial additive tungsten carbide grade KAF82.

The temperature of the capital market can be read more directly. On September 16, the A-share 3D printing sector index rose by more than 2%.