Phoenix Soars – Valley native and CEO attends Trump meeting
- Today Magazine Online
- 2 days ago
- 7 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
• Phoenix Tailings CEO Attends Key National-Security Roundtable in D.C.
Bruce William Deckert
Editor-in-Chief
Today Magazine Online
The story of Phoenix Tailings began in a backyard in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where the company was founded in 2019. The backstory traces to the year before at a Boston-area Bible study and church retreat. For Nick Myers, the founding CEO of Phoenix Tailings, the further-back story commenced in Connecticut's Farmington Valley.
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In early August, the most recent chapter of the soaring Phoenix Tailings story occurred in Washington D.C. — where Myers attended the Roundtable on American Mining hosted by president Donald Trump at the U.S. Department of State.
Phoenix Tailings has become a major player in the international realm of rare-earth metals, the mineral and industrial commodities that are considered crucial for national security as the United States races to replenish weapon systems being utilized in the Iran war. Rare-earth metals and critical minerals are essential for a range of industries — such as aerospace, automotive, biotechnology, defense, electronics and medical technology. In the defense industry, the demand has ramped up since the Iran war began in February.
Myers and chief commercial officer Anthony Balladon represented Phoenix Tailings at the American Mining Roundtable on Friday, August 7.
"It was an honor to have Phoenix Tailings join the Mining Roundtable with President Trump at the U.S. Department of State," Myers wrote in a LinkedIn post after the event. "We have come a long way from where we started, and we still have a long way to go. With the support of the U.S. government, our incredible partners and the team we have built at Phoenix, we look forward to ... ensuring the United States and our allies have secure access to the rare-earth materials that power our modern world."
Myers included a photo with his LinkedIn post and added: "Yes, I definitely took a selfie in a room full of very important people. Anthony Balladon was shaking his head."
Phoenix Tailings CEO Nick Myers at the American Mining Roundtable in Washington D.C. hosted by president Donald Trump
A complementary Facebook post commemorating the occasion noted the CEO's location: "Nick Myers is in Washington D.C." — and in that post, Myers wrote: "This was a pretty cool moment for me honestly. It's harder than you can imagine building a company from scratch. ... Being invited to see the President of the United States was one of those 'wow' we have come a long way moments."
Myers did not personally meet Trump at the mining roundtable, but Phoenix Tailings is one of the American companies the U.S. government is investing in heavily to reduce reliance on China for the rare-earth minerals used in automobiles, aviation components, cellphones, military weapons and so much more.
In mid-June Phoenix Tailings received a conditional $500 million loan from the U.S. Department of War, via the Office of Strategic Capital, to fund construction of the company's Freedom Facility. A key goal is to mitigate the nation's reliance on China and other foreign sources for critical metals. Initial operations are targeted for 2028, according to a Phoenix Tailings press release.
"We call it the Freedom Facility because, ultimately, the purpose of this is to ensure that the entire Western Hemisphere, the United States and its allies are free of Chinese influence within the rare-earth space," Balladon told the Associated Press in a report updated in early August.
"We cannot comment on the Department of War conditional loan much due to confidentiality agreements," Myers tells Today Magazine Online, noting that Phoenix has also received a $66 million grant from the Department of Energy. "These are both major proof points for the company and the culmination of over a year of working with the government. We are honored to have received this support and are working diligently to execute on the plan."
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Asked how he stays grounded after receiving an invitation to a meeting in D.C. hosted by the U.S. president, Myers replies: "I treat it as a responsibility and the calling I have. The invitation recognized the importance of Phoenix's mission, but it did not change the work waiting for us the next morning."
Myers is a 2014 graduate of Saint Michael's College in Vermont (B.S. physics) and he has two master’s degrees: an MBA in marketing from Rochester Institute of Technology (2015) and an MBA in finance from Northeastern University (2017). He played varsity baseball as a pitcher at Saint Michael's, an NCAA Division II school, on a partial athletic scholarship.
"Staying grounded means focusing on our team, serving our customers, and delivering the facilities and production capacity our country needs," Myers observes. "That said, yes, I was incredibly excited to receive the invitation, and I absolutely took a selfie in the room to show everyone."
After the Office of Strategic Capital announced the strategic $500 million financing in June, Phoenix Tailings chief technology officer Tomas Villalon Jr. noted in a LinkedIn post that the conditional loan is a key component of a $1 billion War Department initiative to rebuild America's rare-earth industrial base.
"The Freedom Facility is designed as a platform, and as Phoenix Tailings scales, we intend to expand into additional critical mineral products, leveraging the same technology-first approach that enabled us to rethink rare-earth processing," Villalon wrote in the post.
"I want to personally thank our entire team and everyone who has supported us for the years of hard work spent showing the world that the status quo in critical minerals can be challenged."
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Phoenix Tailings is headquartered in Woburn, Massachusetts, about 10 miles north of Boston City Hall. Two distinct production facilities are located in nearby Burlington and in Exeter, New Hampshire.
"Every team member at Phoenix Tailings understands the responsibility entrusted to us," Myers affirms. "We know what is at stake, and we know that failure is not an option."
In a LinkedIn post published in early August, Balladon wrote: "A $150 million weapons system can be delayed by the absence of $20,000 worth of critical materials. That may be the simplest way to explain why critical minerals have become a national security issue rather than just a supply chain issue."
Myers explained the significance of the company's name in an exclusive Today Magazine interview published in March 2022: "Tailings are the technical term for the mining waste material we work with. Phoenix is the legendary bird that is resurrected. Phoenix Tailings represents life being born from the ashes of the waste."
Byproducts of the mining industry become toxic waste that is discarded in large landfills called tailings ponds. Rather than being resigned to a world where toxic waste sits indefinitely while posing a threat to people and the environment, the Phoenix Tailings team recycles the valuable ore in the tailings and extracts useful primary metals. The metals restored from the former waste ore are salvaged and utilized as raw materials in the diverse array of industries noted above.
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Established in January 2019, Phoenix Tailings began as a dream in the backyard of Villalon's Cambridge apartment.
In a makeshift lab, four of the company's founders built a prototype for drawing out valuable metals from tailings residue. Myers and Villalon became acquainted the year before at a biblically-centered retreat sponsored by the Boston University chapter of FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students).
"We were not started like most deep technology companies, out of a fully funded lab," Myers tells Today Magazine. "Phoenix Tailings was started when I met Tomas Villalon at a Bible study."
During the weekend retreat in 2018, Myers says, "We started talking about all the major challenges in the world, as one does late at night. The major thing we focused on was the 173 billion metric tons of waste produced every year in the metals industry, enough to cover the entire state of California in a foot deep of sludge every year. Immediately, we said: We cannot allow this to continue, and we need to find a solution to this problem."
Five visionary entrepreneurs founded Phoenix Tailings — Myers, Villalon and Balladon, along with former chief operating officer Michelle Chao and Mike Martin, who are no longer employed by the company.
"Every team member at Phoenix Tailings understands the responsibility entrusted to us" — CEO Nick Myers
Martin and Myers were high-school classmates at The Master's School in West Simsbury, a private Christian day school, graduating in 2010. For elementary and middle school, Myers attended Renbrook School, a private institution for preschool through eighth grade based in West Hartford.
He grew up in Canton, in the heart of Connecticut's Farmington Valley.
Brian Modarelli is currently Master's head of school — asked for his thoughts about a Master's graduate being invited to a U.S. State Department meeting with the president of the United States, Modarelli replies, "Nick is an incredibly sharp and accomplished man. Nobody at The Master’s School is remotely surprised that he is at the top of his field and contributing to high-level discussions."
Regarding potential career and life advice for Myers as he continues to lead Phoenix Tailings, Modarelli offers: "Continually seek truth, embrace humility, prioritize family and love God — and great things will tend to follow."
For a graduate of any high school across Connecticut, one's attendance at a Washington D.C. meeting hosted by the president of the United States seems an unlikely occurrence.
Asked whether such a meeting was even remotely on his radar when he graduated from Master's, Myers replies: "Definitely not. I tend to hyperfocus on one thing and let everything else fall away. In 2010, I was solely focused on playing professional baseball."
When that pitching dream didn't pan out, the Phoenix Tailings dream took flight a few years down the road.
"It is amazing what God has planned for us," Myers says. "He used baseball to teach me some of the most important lessons about leadership that I still rely on every day. I could never have imagined the adventure He had in store for me or that I would one day have the opportunity to help America in this way." +
• Stay tuned for a follow-up Phoenix Tailings feature offering more background on the educational-and-career journey of Nicholas (Nick) Myers and his Farmington Valley roots
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