The Nickelhütte Aue is a modern manufacturing site in East Germany for pure non-ferrous metals like nickel, copper, cobalt, molybdenum, vanadium and tungsten. It is descended from the historic Niederpfannenstiel Blue Colour Works (German: Blaufarbenwerk Niederpfannenstiel), a paintworks that was founded in 1635 by Veit Hans Schnorr in Pfannenstiel near Aue.