Since being invented by German scientist in the beginning of 1920s, cemented carbide has been in market as widia and firstly applied in industries for making tungsten filament drawing dies, replacing the expensive diamond drawing dies.

Cemented carbide in China develops quickly even through starting late. By now, the cemented carbide dies have been basically serialized and standardized. In viewing of development conditions in recent years, the research and design theories of cemented carbide dies in China have been deeper, more scientific and more expansive in applications.

Cemented carbide dies in China can be classified into four types according to applications:
Type I are cemented carbide drawing dies: these dies are vast majority among cemented carbide dies. The main trademarks of drawing dies in China are YG8, YG6 and YG3; YG15, YG6X, YG3X are second.

Type II are cold heading and stamping dies and sizing dies with main trademarks of YC20C, YG20, YGl5 and CT35.

Type III are nonmagnetic alloy dies manufacturing magnetic materials. Some factories still carry on research and manufacturing, such as YSN15 in YSN series (including 20, 25, 30, 35, 40) and steel nonmagnetic die trademark TMF.

Type IV are hot working dies without standard trademarks. The demand in market is increasing. Some manufacturers are developing, such as YD40 and forging die CNW by Shanghai Research Institute of Materials. The sales amounts of above four kinds of dies differ a lot because of different developing time, limit of adaptability and promotion measures falling behind.

In the cemented carbide die market, analyzing dies are indispensible important equipment in modern industry. As high and new technology develops, more and more components and products cut and machined are replaced by the molded composed parts, thus the market potential of dies is quite large. According to the statistics by the customs, the imported dies were worthy of USD 977 million (RMB 8 billion) in 2000. The cemented carbide die market increase as the total output of cemented carbide increases.
1. Cemented carbide top hammers. Now the annual output of artificial diamond in China has achieved 60OMg (0.3 Gcar). Calculating according to the consumption of 10kg hammers by manufacturing 200Og (lOkcar) artificial diamond, the annual consumption of top hammers are about 3,000t. Considering technical progress, the consumption will be 1,500-2,000t.

2. Cemented carbide drawing dies. The output of iron and steel in China has exceeded 1,000 million tons and the output of wires has achieved 18 million tons. Besides, the copper and aluminum wires are developing rapidly. The demand for drawing dies occupies 6%-7% of the total output of cemented carbide. Considering technical progress and partial steel alloy replacement, it should be within 400t.

3. Cold heading, stamping, molding and sizing dies. As the machinery, electrical appliance and micro dynamo industries are developing rapidly, a large amount of high speed punching machines are imported. It is estimated that the market volume of such dies is 100-150t.

4. Nonmagnetic dies. In recent years, a series nonmagnetic dies have been developed. The promotion speed is quite slow because of manufacturing difficulty and expansive prices. It is estimated that the demand is within 15t.

5. Hot working cemented carbides. High speed wire roller is a kind of products with rolling grooves or rolling holes. During working, 1,000-11,000C steel blanks go through in 70-120m/min and makes it bear high temperature and high frequency thermal stress, thus it is wearable. Now, there are more than 30 pieces of such production lines with different scales. It is estimated the demand is 100-150t.