Proxima Fusion Partners with Japanese Firms to Build Commercial Fusion Power

A clean-energy company based in Germany is teaming up with Japanese industrial partners to build a commercial fusion power plant. Proxima Fusion signed agreements in Tokyo on October 28 with Fujikura and Kyoto Fusioneering. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi attended the signing ceremony to support stronger trade ties between the two countries.

Fusion energy aims to copy how the sun creates power. It uses super-heated plasma to join light atoms together, which releases massive amounts of energy. Proxima is developing a magnetic confinement device known as a stellarator to hold this hot plasma in place for long periods. The new agreement with Kyoto Fusioneering will expand ongoing work on gyrotrons, which are specialized devices that create high-power microwaves to heat the plasma.

Proxima also partnered with Fujikura to explore manufacturing high-temperature superconducting, or HTS, tape in Germany on an industrial scale. This specialized metallic tape carries electrical current with almost no resistance. Workers wind the tape into coils to form the powerful magnets needed to control the plasma. Proxima CEO and co-founder Francesco Sciortino noted that Fujikura brings deep expertise in manufacturing high-temperature superconductors from its background in optical fibers.

The company is studying plans to build a factory in Lower Saxony expected to cost 140 million euros, or about $160 million. Proxima hopes the facility will produce roughly 5,000 kilometers, or 3,100 miles, of HTS tape annually by 2030. The company expects to need about 20,000 kilometers of tape for its upcoming "Alpha" demonstrator and another 40,000 kilometers for its planned "Stellaris" power station. This facility will be funded partly by a recent $468 million funding round that valued Proxima at $2.7 billion.

Sciortino explained that setting up tape production inside Europe is vital for building the necessary supply chains and industrial capabilities. Ann Mettler, president of the clean-energy think tank Catalyse Europe, noted that Europe has historically struggled to turn its scientific leadership into industrial success. Because Europe relies heavily on outside resources and faces global competition for technology, developing fusion capabilities is a strategic priority.

Proxima aims to achieve net energy gain during the early 2030s by designing a plant that keeps day-to-day operations simple. However, the company faces strong competition from other well-funded firms. Rivals include U.S.-based Commonwealth Fusion Systems and Helion Energy, Canada’s General Fusion, state-backed Chinese developers, and Japan's Helical Fusion. Mettler emphasized that building the required supply chains must happen years before a plant is ready, as frontier technologies cannot simply be switched on overnight.

Summary

Proxima Fusion's partnerships in Japan mark a crucial step toward building Europe's first commercial fusion power plant. By securing a reliable supply of high-temperature superconducting tape and manufacturing it locally, the company hopes to turn scientific research into an industrial reality while competing with global rivals.