Author and TCT Expert Advisory Board Member Filip Geerts is the Director General of CECIMO, the European Association of the Machine Tool Industries. In June CECIMO organised its Additive Manufacturing Conference and here, Filip gives TCT his takeaways.
Additive Manufacturing (AM) has been a hot topic in European manufacturing for many years. Since it is now reaching production status, the EU is increasingly setting its sights on the technology, as AM is seen as a way of upgrading the continent’s industrial base.
At the fourth edition of the Additive Manufacturing European Conference (AMEC), organised by CECIMO at the European Parliament on 21 June, the EU set down a clear message that more investment is needed to encourage the industrialisation of the technology.
The European Commission discussed at length its measures to foster the uptake of AM across the continent. For instance, the Digitising European Industry initiative appears to be playing an especially major role in this regard. So-called Digital Innovation Hubs were tipped as one of the four priority areas; together with regulations, skills and research partnerships.
The Hubs will consist of decentralised competence centres across Europe – building on existing AM knowledge and information at a local level. The goal, also discussed at AMEC, is to create ecosystems of companies, research centres and universities that would ultimately allow any company – big or small and located anywhere across the continent – to benefit from digital innovation.
And while Digital Innovation Hubs encompass a broad range of technologies and sectors, AM clearly emerged as one at the forefront. Decentralisation, as European Commission officials explained at the conference, is seen as a key ingredient for turning the Hubs into a success.
Digital Innovation Hubs are tools that can create space for bottom-up initiatives to emerge. The examples of collaborative activities on laser technologies – a field closely interconnected with AM – were presented as a successful case of ongoing Digital Innovation Hubs.
Rising funds, rising growth
The type of EU investment pouring into the development of the Hubs is part of a larger R&D funding pool embedded in Horizon 2020, the EU’s flagship research programme. This funding stream is also made up of public-private partnerships (PPPs), grants, pilots and platforms.
Recent figures confirm that the EU is taking more decisive action on AM. In only the first three years of its implementation period, Horizon 2020 funded 27 AM projects with €113 million, 70% of what the previous programme (2007-2013) spent on AM. For 2007 to 2013, the budget amounted to €160 million for a total of 60 EU projects – in other words, the EU now dedicates more money per AM project.
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Exhibit at the UK's definitive and most influential 3D printing and additive manufacturing event, TCT 3Sixty.
Global competition
Other countries and regions are advancing on the technology too, so it remains important for Europe to keep up.
In December 2017, China launched the Action Plan on Additive Manufacturing as part of its ‘Made in China 2025’ long-term initiative.
R&D plays an instrumental role in the country, to boost know-how and accelerate the deployment of AM at a large scale. This included the establishment of a new AM-related R&D centre, aiming to attract foreign companies to invest in China.
In the United States, America Makes – the country’s public-private partnership on AM – has so far managed a portfolio of about $115 million for AM R&D and workforce in its six years of implementation.
As the voice of the AM industry in Europe, CECIMO gave a clear message to Members of the European Parliament and European Commission officials joining the Additive Manufacturing European Conference 2018. Together with a supportive regulatory framework in Europe and bolder standardisation actions, a long-term EU funding commitment to the growth of AM must be guaranteed.
The kick-off of the new EU multi-annual budget programme in 2021 offers critical opportunities to step up investment in additive technologies and keep up with the likes of the US and China. CECIMO will follow budgetary negotiations among EU institutions very closely, to ensure AM carves out a central role in the EU research budget and concrete investment pledges are made to those involved in the ecosystem.
