Industry 4.0: what it is and why it is an opportunity for manufacturing companies

whitePaper | September 21, 2022

Additive manufacturing (AM) has matured significantly as a manufacturing technique over the last 5 years. Along with this, knowledge of AM within companies has increased and its opportunities are increasingly discussed at board-level. Time and budget are invested to explore the potential for 3D printing beyond the most obvious applications. More than ever before, there’s an appetite to take a strategic approach and maximize the opportunity

whitePaper | May 20, 2022

Manufacturing and industrial technologies are major drivers of societal wealth. In 2019, the manufacturing sector accounted for two million enterprises, €2,078 billion in gross value added, and 32.1 million jobs in the EU-27 area.1 The European economy is highly dependent on the manufacturing industry and exporting of manufactured goods. Around 10 percent of all enterprises in the EU’s non-financial business economy are classified as manufacturing.2 The transition of societies to climate neutrality and circularity pushes for changes in operations and creates new business opportunities for companies. Markets are shifting towards green products and services to meet conscious consumers’ needs and comply with the new and upcoming EU regulations that strive to reduce net greenhouse emissions by at least 55% by 2030.3

whitePaper | May 26, 2023

Today’s advanced tooling manufacturers want to design and iterate faster, speed up production times, assure yield quality, and improve the durability and performance of their inserts. Achieving all this, and more, is mission critical to the needs of customers in the aerospace, energy, automotive, and other industries for whom the rapid and repeatable production of high-quality cast parts is essential. Until now the limitations of conventional 3D metal printers made it difficult for tooling manufacturers to harness the full potential of additive manufacturing (AM) and advanced tooling manufacturing processes. But no more.

whitePaper | August 3, 2022

Automakers, OEMs, and suppliers have faced unprecedented challenges in the wake of COVID-19. From chip shortages to truck barricades on the US–Canada border cutting off the flow of products, the automotive industry has been severely impacted by challenges that are leading to a loss of sales and frustrated customers. Advanced technologies are no longer “nice to have” but are now essential as automotive manufacturers step up their game to provide customers with more for less. Patched together, legacy systems, and outdated functionality tend to create more confusion than answers. Disconnected, siloed teams struggle with unreliable data and no clear vision for gaining new customers and retaining the old.

whitePaper | August 31, 2022

The business case for collaboration and cross-functional transformation Faced with significant and ongoing disruption in the industry, manufacturing companies have known for years that digital transformation is essential to maintain a competitive edge. COVID-19 has only accelerated the need for digital transformation. The pandemic has disrupted supply chains, created an increasingly distributed and remote workforce, caused significant changes in demand, and increased the challenges of providing field service. To address these changes, manufacturing companies have accelerated their investments in digitization. According to McKinsey, advances in this area are now ahead of schedule by three to four years.1

whitePaper | June 26, 2022

the state-of-the-art procedure and the currently valid standards are presented. Subsequently, existing gaps and possible issues related to additive manufacturing (AM) technology are pointed out. Finally, a feasible procedure is outlined. This first section deals with the process chain and their qualification and validation. Until recently, there was no standard definition of the AM manufacturing process steps. There was a broad consensus to divide the process into pre-, in-, and post-process, but there was no clear division.