Global demand for ion exchange resins is spread across a wide set of end-use industries, led by pharmaceuticals, industrial water treatment and municipal water treatment, followed by mining, electrical and electronics, power generation, nuclear power, food and beverage, chemical production, and research and development.
The common thread is that all of these industries either need water of a defined purity, or need to recover or remove specific dissolved species. In ultrapure water for microchips the requirement is absence of ionic residue; in mining it is selective concentration of valuable metals; in pharmaceuticals it is reproducible purification backed by validation.
Because the underlying chemistry is the same, a resin selected for one industry often transfers directly to another. What changes is specification, certification and grade.