Lilac Solutions

Lilac is one of the most mature bets in direct lithium extraction, the technology widely seen as the key to unlocking brine resources that conventional evaporation ponds cannot economically or quickly tap. Its ion-exchange beads selectively absorb lithium and release it as a concentrated solution, running continuously across diverse brine chemistries with high recovery, low cost and a fraction of the land, water and time that months-long evaporation ponds demand. That modular, chemistry-agnostic flexibility is the differentiator in a field where most DLE approaches are tuned to one brine type. The capital base is deep for the sector — roughly $318M raised, anchored by a $145M Series C (February 2024, led by Mercuria and Lowercarbon, with Breakthrough Energy Ventures, T. Rowe Price, BMW i Ventures and Mitsubishi) — and, critically, the commercial anchor is now in place: in January 2026 Lilac signed a binding 10-year offtake with Traxys for 50,000 tonnes of lithium carbonate from its Great Salt Lake project in Utah, covering 100% of planned Phase 1 output (5,000 tpa). With FEL-3 engineering complete and permitting underway toward a 2026 construction start, Lilac is converting a decade of DLE R&D into a permitted, fully-contracted commercial plant. If brine-based DLE becomes the dominant new source of battery-grade lithium — as many forecasts assume it must — Lilac has the technology breadth, the capital, and now the offtake to be a foundational supplier.