Company finds gold in discarded cellphones
Print Edition
Digital waste such as discarded cellphones, MP3 players and computers, which would otherwise be deemed worthless, is being turned into gold, literally, by Jading-based TES-AMM Corporation Ltd.
As manufacturers speed up technology updates, products are being rendered obsolete at a faster rate and in greater numbers.
TES-AMM sees that as a chance to dig out something valuable.
“A cellphone’s mainboard and components contain precious metals like gold, silver, palladium, platinum and common metals like aluminum and copper,” said Kang Junfeng, the company’s deputy general manager.
Recycle alone produces the metals, but if the components could be used again, profits can be even higher. That is what Kang and his team have been working on.
Seeking high profits
“The fast product upgrading is driving us to innovate on our technologies, too,” Kang said. Televisions, air-conditioners, fridges and computers are among the items that quickly become old products.
In 2009, a national policy to replace old appliances with new ones generated large amounts of such items being discarded.
That could have caused huge damage to the environment if not properly dealt with.
Kang led a project to automate the process of dissembling and handling the obsolete display screens.
Each of the company’s production lines can process 4,000 screens a day, largely cutting down the human labor and the potential damage to the environment.
Now as new energy vehicles become a trend, an increasing number of lithium batteries are thrown away. Since 2007, TES-AMM has been dealing with the problem.
Using its own technology, it has increased the recycling rate for used batteries to as much as 98 percent.
Cellphones are the next area TES-AMM is looking at. The company has a line that can dissemble 10 million used cellphones a year.
“If the product assembling has taken the recycling into consideration in the first place, we might be able to collect complete parts off the products and make more profits,” Kang said, and this is what he will tap into in collaboration with his partners.
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