A newly launched research collaboration aims to bolster Australia’s advanced manufacturing base by putting a domestically produced titanium powder through its paces for high-value industrial use. The material in question, TiRO powder, is a titanium feedstock made via a process the developers describe as highly efficient and low in emissions.
The A$677,000 program is headed by Coogee Titanium alongside The University of Queensland (UQ), with backing from the Additive Manufacturing Cooperative Research Centre (AMCRC). Its central question is whether TiRO powder can be turned into high-quality titanium parts through additive manufacturing and other advanced techniques. If it can, the payoff could be substantial: lower costs, a smaller environmental footprint, and a route for Australia to stand up its own titanium components supply chain running all the way from raw material to finished part.
Putting the Powder Up Against the Incumbents
The research will measure TiRO powder against the titanium powders already dominant in additive manufacturing, namely gas atomized and hydride-dehydride grades. A key focus is how trace impurities, chiefly magnesium and chlorine, shape the microstructure and mechanical behavior of the resulting components.
To map out where the material stands, the team will run it through processes including Laser Powder Bed Fusion (L-PBF) and Hot Isostatic Pressing (HIPing), with the goal of pinpointing the applications where TiRO powder can hold its own against established options, and where it might do better.
UQ’s project lead, Associate Professor Michael Bermingham, said the work would yield essential data on how the material performs. “Understanding how this new titanium powder behaves during manufacturing is essential,” he said. “By comparing it directly with established materials and studying the role of impurities, we can determine whether it is suitable for producing high-quality, reliable components.”
Building the Case for a Sovereign Supply Chain
For Coogee Titanium, the project is a milestone in taking Australian titanium powder and parts to buyers worldwide. Technical Director Peter Duxson framed it as a proving exercise. “This project is about proving that TiRO powder can meet the performance demands of advanced manufacturing while delivering cost and sustainability benefits,” he said. “We’ve developed a unique production process and invested in multiple facilities here in Australia, and this research will help unlock its full commercial potential across both domestic and international markets.”
AMCRC Managing Director Simon Marriott pointed to the project’s fit with wider national goals for the sector. “This collaboration highlights the importance of connecting industry and research to accelerate innovation,” he said. “Developing a competitive, locally produced titanium feedstock has the potential to transform Australia’s additive manufacturing ecosystem and reduce reliance on imported materials.”
The program is set to produce a thorough picture of how manufacturable the powder is and how it performs, giving Coogee Titanium the evidence to identify target markets across aerospace, defense and medical manufacturing. In doing so, it moves Australia a step closer to a fully integrated, home-grown titanium supply chain.
The Global Race to Onshore Titanium Feedstock
Coogee’s bet is a sovereignty play as much as a technical one. By validating a locally made, lower-emissions feedstock against the incumbent gas atomized and HDH powders, it is trying to close the gap between Australia’s raw titanium resources and the finished, qualified components that aerospace, defense and medical buyers actually purchase, a supply chain that currently leans heavily on imported material and a small number of foreign suppliers.
The same anxiety is driving comparable, better-funded efforts elsewhere. In the US, materials firm IperionX has been assembling a domestic titanium supply chain built on proprietary hydrogen-based processes that promise a more cost-effective and sustainable route to titanium metal while cutting reliance on conventional, energy-intensive methods dependent on imported feedstock. Like Coogee, its pitch pairs a novel production method with the argument that the market alone won’t solve the sourcing problem.
Recycling is the other route to the same goal. 6K Additive is expanding US powder production with heavy federal backing, converting scrap, including military-grade scrap into high-performance powder via its proprietary UniMelt process, into domestic feedstock for critical defense metals. Where 6K reclaims titanium from waste and Coogee makes it fresh from a cleaner process, both are chasing the same prize: cutting the cord to imported powder.
As feedstock increasingly shapes the additive manufacturing landscape, Coogee is working to establish Australia as a credible domestic supplier.
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Featured image shows TiRO powder’s manufacturability and performance. Photo via Coogee Titanium.
