55 Proposed Jobs at Ionic Technologies' £89m Belfast Magnet Plant Now Wait on Planning Approval

A Belfast magnet-recycling company has asked for permission to build an £89m plant that would create 55 new jobs and safeguard a further 25. The operative word is would. The plan from the Queen's University spin-out Ionic Technologies went to Belfast City Council as a planning application, and the jobs are subject to approval. The government grant is still an offer in principle, and parent company Ionic Rare Earths was still seeking the remaining equity capital for a final investment decision, its 27 January 2026 ASX filing said. For Metaintro readers in Northern Ireland, the useful part is the timeline and the paperwork behind the headline, which in our view help you judge when these roles could appear. Here is what the planning announcement, the parent company's stock exchange filings and the planning rules actually say.

What Exactly Has Ionic Technologies Applied to Build?

The proposal is a 10,798 sq m magnet recycling and refining facility on a vacant, previously developed site at Harland Road in Channel Commercial Park. In imperial terms that is a 116,000 sq ft building. The site sits in the industrial and commercial end of Titanic Quarter, and the scheme is planned for a seven-acre brownfield site close to the Samson and Goliath cranes.

The proposed £89m investment would include a recycling and refining plant, offices, car parking, landscaping and site infrastructure. The plant would recover, separate and refine rare-earth elements from end-of-life magnets and manufacturing waste, producing high-purity rare-earth oxides for electric vehicles, wind turbines and advanced manufacturing.

The parent company's filings give the scale. Under the design in its 27 January 2026 ASX filing, the commercial plant would recycle 1,200 tonnes of end-of-life magnets, swarf and pre-consumer waste a year and would produce 400 metric tonnes of separated rare earth oxides a year. The same 27 January 2026 ASX filing calls that a 40-fold increase in capacity from the capacity of the company's existing demonstration plant, which has a capacity of 10 metric tonnes a year.

The investment figure differs between sources. The 27 January 2026 ASX filing called it the £85 million project, while the planning announcement puts the investment at £89m.

How Many Jobs Would the Plant Create, and Do They Exist Yet?

The company says the facility would create 55 new jobs and safeguard a further 25 already employed at the company's existing Belfast operation. So the announcement combines two numbers, 55 new roles and 25 existing posts kept. In our reading, only the new roles would add to headcount.

Business Eye describes the 55 as jobs the proposed facility would create, and the announcement does not say when recruitment would start. Tim Harrison, managing director of parent company Ionic Rare Earths, used conditional wording, with the facility creating highly skilled jobs subject to approval, and Business Eye reports that, if approved, the plant would expand the existing Belfast operation.

Harrison described the future work as highly skilled jobs but the announcement does not say which roles the new posts would cover, what they would pay or when recruitment would start. Treat the number as a plan attached to a planning application, not as a set of vacancies you can apply for today.

Subject to approval, the facility would create highly skilled jobs, support advanced manufacturing and return rare-earth materials already in circulation to the supply chain, Ionic Rare Earths managing director Tim Harrison said, according to the Business Eye report on the application.

Where Does the Planning Process Stand Right Now?

According to the parent company's 13 July 2026 ASX filing, Ionic Technologies submitted a Proposal of Application Notice to Belfast City Council on 2 April 2026, and a public consultation period followed. The period included a public consultation event on 21 May 2026 and closed on 12 June 2026.

In its 13 July 2026 ASX filing, the parent company records that the consultation period concluded with no objections. The formal application is a new step, and the company was still in a Pre-Application Discussion process with the Authority at the time of that 13 July 2026 filing, while aiming for a full application in Q3 2026.

The planning application has now gone in. It was submitted to Belfast City Council with environmental, transport and economic assessments, and it was reported on September 28, 2026. The Business Eye report on the submission gives no decision date.

Who Decides, and Where Can You Read the File?

In Northern Ireland, local councils are responsible for most planning decisions, and they decide all local and major applications. The Department for Infrastructure decides regionally significant and called-in applications. Before making a major application, a pre-application community consultation is required. The announcements do not say which category this application falls into.

Each council follows a Scheme of Delegation that splits applications between the planning committee and planning officers. The nidirect guide says which applications go to the committee, and the announcements do not say whether this one will.

The committee will decide applications for large developments, contentious applications and those that receive objections, according to the nidirect guide to planning decisions.

You do not have to take anyone's word for what is in the file. Once an application is submitted, its plans, maps, drawings, forms and associated documents appear on the Planning Register, which is publicly available. In our reading, the economic impact assessment submitted with the application counts as an associated document, so it should appear there too.

How Is the £89m Plant Being Paid For?

The parent company's 27 January 2026 ASX filing calls the grant the cornerstone of the plant's capital investment, and, as of that filing, it had been offered but not finalised, pending a Final Grant Offer Letter. Ionic has an Offer in Principle for a £12m capital grant from the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, made with the Advanced Propulsion Centre UK under the DRIVE35 programme, and it remains subject to relevant conditions and approvals.

Business Eye ties the grant to the Automotive Transformation Fund DRIVE35 programme. DRIVE35 also has a Scale-up Fund, delivered by the centre with Innovate UK, and on that fund's page an offer in principle lets a business reach out to other investors to raise additional funds. The announcements of the planning submission do not say whether Ionic's grant came from this fund.

The parent company's 27 January 2026 ASX filing sets out its own next steps. The next step it set out, using the department name in that filing, was to work with the Department for Business and Trade and the centre on the due diligence needed to access the funding, alongside talks with potential strategic investors about the remaining equity capital needed for a final investment decision. In its 13 July 2026 ASX filing, the parent company was targeting a Final Investment Decision by the end of the September quarter. The announcements of the planning submission did not say whether that decision has been made.

In our view, that decision matters as much as the planning decision, because a plant with permission but no funding is unlikely to hire.

What Would the Build Mean for Construction Workers?

Our reading is that, once the plant goes ahead, the first large block of work would be on the building site. An economic impact assessment submitted with the application estimates that the 30-week construction phase could support the equivalent of around 275 full-time construction jobs and generate £19.6m in gross value added across Northern Ireland.

Note the wording. The figure is an estimate of equivalent full-time jobs across a 30-week build and comes from an assessment submitted with the application. In our reading, that is not a head count of separate hires.

On timing, in the 13 July 2026 ASX filing, Ionic Rare Earths managing director Tim Harrison said the intention was for front-end engineering design work to conclude later this year to support initial procurement of long lead items and commencement of construction in 2027. According to the same filing, that design work is being done by Tenova Advanced Technologies in partnership with IonicRE's own technical staff, with the study starting in June 2026. If you work in the trades, the build is a 2027 prospect in parent company Ionic Rare Earths' 13 July 2026 ASX filing. Our guide on how to launch an electrician career is written for US readers, but it explains how an apprenticeship route into that kind of site work is structured.

Who Works at Ionic Technologies Today, and Is It Hiring?

The company is not new to Belfast. It was set up in 2016 as SerenTech to commercialise research at Queen's into ionic liquid technology, and it was acquired in 2022 by the Australian company Ionic Rare Earths.

It has grown before. In a May 2023 company update, then general manager Thomas Kelly said it had launched with just 5 staff and had increased in size to 17 people, and praised the strength of applicants for high-level scientific positions. The same 2023 update described a new demonstration plant at its facility at the Titanic Quarter.

The company's current careers page lists one live role, an Operational EHSQ Manager for the demonstration plant. The job is to build, implement and manage an Integrated Management System, compliant with ISO standards, and to keep working practices safe and environmentally responsible.

In our view, that single posting is the clearest window onto the business as it runs today. Our take is that the safety and quality function is the backbone any bigger site would be built around, which makes this role worth a close look.

What Does the Plant Do, and What Kind of Work Would It Involve?

The technology came out of a university lab. The company was set up to commercialise academic research carried out at Queen's under Prof Peter Nockemann into using ionic liquid technology to separate metals.

The parent company's 27 January 2026 ASX filing says the plant will produce high purity (99.5% plus) separated magnet rare earth oxides. In that filing, Tim Harrison said the oxides the company produces are 99.5% purity or above, which makes them appropriate for the highest specification of next generation motor magnets. The output list in that filing includes neodymium oxide, didymium oxide, dysprosium oxide and terbium oxide.

According to the 13 July 2026 ASX filing, the engineering partner was picked for its track record in rare earth processing, and it brings experience in solvent extraction, electrowinning and mixer/settler design, and the design study covers process flow diagrams, equipment lists, control philosophy and power demand. Our reading is that a plant like this leans on process chemistry, plant operation, maintenance and quality control. If you already work in a lab, our guide on clinical laboratory technician certification, written for US readers, is a sensible next read.

Why Does Ionic Say the UK Needs This Kind of Plant?

Supply is the argument. Ionic says rare-earth materials are critical to electric vehicles and wind turbines, yet supply remains concentrated in international markets and exposed to long supply chains. Ionic Rare Earths, in its 27 January 2026 ASX filing, links the plant to a UK strategy that targets producing 10% of the UK's mineral needs domestically and 20% through recycling by 2035.

A report supporting the application also puts a price on it. Once running, the facility is projected to contribute around £11m a year in net additional GVA to the Northern Ireland economy and approximately £325,000 a year in non-domestic rates. Those are projections in a document written to support the application, so read them as the company's case rather than a settled outcome.

Government has backed the company before. Ionic previously secured a £1.72m grant from the Innovate UK Automotive Transformation Fund Scale up Readiness Validation programme. The parent company's 27 January 2026 ASX filing puts its earlier UK capital grant funding at circa £5 million.

What This Means for Job Seekers, and What Should You Do Next?

In our reading, this is a real project with real paperwork but not yet a hiring drive, and the 55 new jobs sit behind three gates, a planning decision on the application submitted to Belfast City Council, a grant that is still an offer in principle, and a final investment decision the parent company, in its 13 July 2026 ASX filing, was aiming to reach by the end of the September quarter. Our view is that the smart move is to prepare now and apply later, not to wait for a job board to fill.

Here is what we would do:

• Track the case. Search the public Planning Register for the Harland Road application and look for the economic impact assessment.
• Watch the funding news. In our view, a final investment decision from Ionic Rare Earths, targeted in its 13 July 2026 ASX filing, would be the clearest signal that hiring could follow.
• Check the live vacancy. If you have safety, environmental or quality management experience, the current EHSQ role is listed as live on its careers page.
• Build process skills. In our view, plant operation, quality control and lab work are the strongest bets for a chemical recycling site, so a relevant certificate earns its keep.
• Trades, plan for 2027. Construction is pencilled in for 2027 in parent company Ionic Rare Earths' 13 July 2026 ASX filing, so, in our view, starting an apprenticeship or ticket now is worth considering ahead of the build.

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People Also Asked

Q: Has the Ionic Technologies Belfast plant been approved?

A: No. The company has submitted a planning application to Belfast City Council, and the plant still needs approval. The parent company's 13 July 2026 ASX filing was also targeting a final investment decision by the end of the September quarter, and the planning announcements did not say whether that has happened.

Q: How many jobs would the Belfast magnet recycling plant create?

A: The company says the facility would create 55 new jobs and safeguard a further 25 already employed at its existing Belfast operation, while an assessment submitted with the application estimates the 30-week construction phase could support the equivalent of around 275 full-time construction jobs.

Q: Is Ionic Technologies hiring now?

A: Its careers page currently lists one live role, an Operational EHSQ Manager for its demonstration plant.

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