Fujikura to supply over 10,000 km of tape to Commonwealth Fusion Systems
The Sept. 30 agreement covers tape for ARC fusion plants, but neither the purchase price nor the first delivery date was disclosed.
Ines Halvorsen
Sept. 30 brought an order for more than 10,000 kilometres of superconducting tape to Fujikura Ltd. TYO5803 under a long-term supply agreement with Commonwealth Fusion Systems. Fujikura had announced a separate ¥5.6 billion investment in tape production in February; the Sept. 30 release gave no price for this order. The customer, privately held Commonwealth Fusion Systems, or CFS, said the tape will first serve its planned ARC fusion plant in Virginia, but did not specify the contract's duration.
At 1:58:54 p.m. JST on Wednesday, Fujikura shares traded at ¥5,239 in Tokyo, according to the TYO5803 quote.
CFS described the purchase as the largest single order for high-temperature superconducting tape and said Fujikura is expanding manufacturing capacity to deliver it. The quantity exceeds 10,000 kilometres, which CFS also measured as three gigaampere-metres. Its announcement did not give annual volumes, a first-shipment date or the payment schedule.
The tape is intended for ARC plants, starting with a proposed plant in Chesterfield County, Va. A December 2024 CFS plan described that first plant as producing about 400 megawatts, with grid power expected in the early 2030s. The Sept. 30 order did not update the plant's construction or first-power dates.
Fujikura Set a Tape Capacity Target for Fiscal 2027
Fujikura's Feb. 9 expansion notice put new tape-production spending at ¥5.6 billion, following about ¥6 billion invested in fiscal 2024. The earlier programme targeted production capacity three to four times its previous level by fiscal 2027. Fujikura said the additional spending should further increase production capacity by approximately twofold. Neither notice gives production capacity in kilometres a year, making it impossible to translate the CFS order into a specified number of factory operating years.
Superconducting tape carries current through the magnets used to confine plasma in a fusion reactor. In its Feb. 9 notice, Fujikura said its tape supports the magnetic fields needed to control plasma at about 100 million degrees Celsius. The physical tape length in the order does not disclose the number of magnets Fujikura will supply or how many ARC plants it could equip.
"This partnership with Fujikura demonstrates how we’re actively placing orders and getting ready to execute our ARC power plant once our SPARC fusion machine achieves Q>1," CFS chief executive Bob Mumgaard said in the Sept. 30 release.
Fujikura's September 2025 statement said it had supplied superconducting wire to CFS since the American company's founding and had invested in CFS alongside a Japanese consortium. The Sept. 30 agreement adds a defined tape quantity to that existing supplier relationship, though CFS did not say whether the order replaces earlier commitments.
CFS's latest release describes the agreement as long-term, but does not state a price per kilometre, annual minimum purchase or delivery calendar. Fujikura's February spending is a factory investment, not a disclosed value for the CFS contract. Until the companies publish shipment and pricing terms, the order's revenue timing remains unknown.
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CFS's December 2024 schedule called for its SPARC demonstration machine to produce first plasma in 2026, ahead of the early-2030s grid target for ARC. The Sept. 30 tape agreement did not update the first-plasma target or date Fujikura's first shipment.
