News Release

Tokamak Energy and Furukawa Electric Group have agreed to establish a joint operational base in Japan to manufacture critical fusion energy power plant magnet technology.

It follows an international partnership between the UK and Japanese governments to collaborate on fusion energy, the power of the stars, announced today during a meeting between Kerry McCarthy, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Climate) and Hiroshi Masuko, Senior Deputy Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. During their meeting, both governments welcomed the signing of the agreement.

Tokamak Energy has built a wide network of government, commercial, scientific and academic partners in Japan in recent years. Together with Furukawa Electric, the company is supporting the FAST (Fusion Advanced Superconducting Tokamak) development project, which aims to demonstrate fusion-based electricity generation in the 2030s.

The partners will also pursue other uses for their transformative high temperature superconducting (HTS) magnet technology, which will unlock new levels of performance and sustainability in a range of industries including science and medicine, manufacturing, power generation and distribution, and land, water, air and space propulsion.

Furukawa Electric entered into an investment agreement with Tokamak Energy in December 2023, building on a longstanding strategic partnership aimed at realising zero carbon, safe and abundant fusion energy.

Warrick Matthews, Tokamak Energy CEO, said: “Our magnet technology is an essential part of turning the promise of limitless clean fusion energy into commercial reality. This new venture with Furukawa Electric Group will ramp up our manufacturing capabilities and open a new era of superconducting performance in a range of sectors, from powering data centres to revolutionising electric zero emission motors. Together we can make a global impact by transforming industry and driving innovation.”

Hideya Moridaira, President, Furukawa Electric Group, said: “We are truly honoured to take this important step forward with Tokamak Energy, deepening our collaboration and initiating efforts toward manufacturing HTS magnet technology for fusion energy in Japan. At Furukawa Electric Group, we have long been dedicated to the research and development of superconducting technologies, applying them across a wide range of fields including energy and healthcare.”

“This partnership marks a significant milestone toward realising sustainable, safe, and virtually limitless fusion energy. By combining our HTS technology with Tokamak Energy’s innovative fusion technology, we are confident we can contribute meaningfully to the next generation of energy solutions.”

Creating fusion energy requires strong magnetic fields to confine and control the extremely hot hydrogen fuel, which becomes a plasma several times hotter than the sun inside a vessel called a tokamak.

Strong magnetic fields are generated by passing large electrical currents through arrays of electromagnetic coils that surround the plasma. The magnets are wound with precision from HTS tapes, manufactured by Furukawa Electric and its group company, SuperPower Inc., using multi-layered metal conductors with a crucial internal coating of ‘rare earth barium copper oxide’ (REBCO) superconducting material.

FAST is a private-sector-led collaboration between industry and academia, led by newly-formed Starlight Engine Ltd with support from experts in Japan and around the world. The project contributes significantly to the Japanese Government’s ‘Fusion Energy Innovation Strategy’, which sets a road map to commercialise fusion and achieve its decarbonisation goals.

Tokamak Energy is a leading global commercial fusion energy company. We are a world leader in two transformative technologies: the compact spherical tokamak and High Temperature Superconducting (HTS) magnets. One company, with licensable technology for commercialising clean, secure and affordable fusion energy and enabling new levels of performance in HTS applications that change the world in which we live today.

Founded in 2009 as a spin-off from UK Atomic Energy Authority, we employ a growing team of over 260 people with experts from the UK and around the world. This combines world leading scientific, engineering, industrial and commercial capabilities. We have 77 families of patent applications and have raised $335 million, comprising $275 million from private investors and $60 million funded from the UK and U.S. governments.

U.S. subsidiary, Tokamak Energy Inc, was established in 2019 and is one of eight companies selected by the Department of Energy for an award as part of its Milestone Program to deliver commercial fusion in the US. We established our Japanese subsidiary, Tokamak Energy K.K in 2025.

Since its establishment in 1884, Furukawa Electric Group has 127 group companies including Furukawa Electric Co., Ltd., and approximately 50,000 employees around the world. We provide a wide range of technologies, products, and services around the world for infrastructure fields such as information and energy, automotive systems fields, and electronics fields with our 4 core technologies of metals, polymers, photonics, high frequency.

Furukawa Electric contributes to society by developing a wide range of products. Since the 1960s, we have developed low-temperature superconducting (LTS) wires and contributed to International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) and other fusion experimental reactors.

Since its establishment in March 2000, SuperPower has been developing and commercializing HTS technologies for a variety of applications such as energy, medical, transportation, and research sectors where high energy density, high magnetic fields, or environmentally friendly properties are emphasized.

Recently, we have been advancing compact fusion technology with HTS wires, collaborating with Tokamak Energy. Our commitment is in line with sustainable fusion energy solutions under our purpose "Composing the core of a brighter world," we continue to contribute to the development of various fields through innovative technologies.

When a mix of two forms of hydrogen (deuterium and tritium) are heated to form a controlled plasma at high temperatures – hotter than the core of the sun – they fuse together to create helium and release energy which can be harnessed to produce electricity and heat.

This hot plasma is confined using strong magnets in a spherical-shaped device called a ‘tokamak’. The energy created from fusion can be used to generate electricity and heat in the same way as existing power stations. Fusion is extremely efficient, creating many million times more energy, per kilogram of fuel, than burning coal, oil, or gas.

Superconductors conduct electricity with zero resistance when cooled below their critical temperature, enabling high current densities with minimal power loss.

High temperature superconductors operate at significantly higher temperatures (20–77 Kelvin) compared to conventional low temperature superconductors (LTS), which require cooling to 4 Kelvin. This removes the need for complex liquid helium systems, making HTS five times more energy efficient and vastly more practical for widespread use.

When engineered into magnets, HTS enables exceptionally strong and stable magnetic fields within compact, lightweight systems. It represents a stepchange in performance, efficiency, sustainability and cost-effectiveness for a wide range of industries.

The Furukawa Electric Group's approach to the SDGs: