Stefan Ritt of SLM Solutions with the SLM 280.
There was something of an influx of additive manufacturing (AM) exhibitors at the Paris Air Show, SLM Solutions can count themselves as pioneers having been the first metal 3D printing company to exhibit at the world's largest aerospace event back in 2011.
“My heart hangs on this show,” Stefan Ritt, VP Global Marketing and Communications, tells me during a sit-down on SLM’s booth in Paris. “That year we reached an agreement with Multistation to be our exclusive French agency, and then in the following two years we sold 30 machines into France. We also made first contact with Ferrari Motorsports at this show now we have an SLM 500 with them.”
Stefan has been in metal AM since the very beginning having joined MCP back in 1998. MCP introduced Selective Laser Melting (SLM) technology in 2000, in 2008 MCP became MTT Technologies Group and in 2011 after a UK Germany company split one-half of MTT became SLM Solutions.
Such is Stefan’s experience in Metal AM he represents SLM Solutions as Chairman of a DIN/ISO work group on Additive manufacturing in aerospace, Section coordinator of European Standardisation for ASD-STAND and as an Industry Expert on AM for the European Commission and the European Liaison Officer for the Additive Manufacturing Users Group.
The Rocky Road
The back-end of 2016 was something of a rollercoaster ride for the German metal AM company. It all started with what looked like some promising news as GE announced an intention to acquire SLM Solutions and Arcam in September 2016. Elliot Management - a hedge fund that owns 20% of SLM Solutions - decided the offer was not in the best interests of the company. GE immediately turned its attention to Concept Laser and completed a deal in less than a month. The start of 2017 then saw a CEO removed with immediate effect. Stefan has remained philosophical throughout:
"Life is what it is. There's the good old British saying of, 'Keep Calm and Carry On'. We shouldn't feel paralysed now that GE is taking a big chunk. We all have a valid position in this industry; we have a long research and scientific history in this technology. GE has more than 20 SLM Solutions machines throughout the U.S., and there’s a reason we were their first target for acquisition.
"It looks like they're now using SLM colours," jokes Stefan about Concept Laser and Arcam's post-GE blue rebranding.
The Road Ahead
The new SLM Solutions HQ in Lübeck, Germany
Despite the short-term bumpiness, SLM Solutions has good reason to be bullish; revenue continues to grow at such a rate that German news magazine Focus recognised the company as one of the fastest growing businesses in Germany. The growth means the company is having to move to a new HQ in its home town of Lübeck. In May 2017, SLM celebrated the topping out ceremony of the new building on a 17-acre campus and will move in in Spring 2018.
2017 has also seen several multi-order deals announced via its investor channel including the largest single order of SLM 500 machines to date as an unnamed Chinese organisation ordered ten machines. Considering there were some 13 new Chinese metal 3D printer manufacturers, all using the letters S-L-M at TCT Asia this year, this order - totalling up to EUR 12 million - is testament to the quality of technology coming out of SLM Solutions.
The machine on display at the Paris Air Show was the SLM 280 2.0 - its mid-range device available in several laser configurations that can rapidly increase the speed at which the machine scans the powder-bed. But Stefan is particularly proud of a development in the machine that may seem less significant:
"We've worked a lot on the gas flow. The machine build chamber now has sintered side plates that diffuse the gas flow and avoids turbulence inside the build chamber, safeguarding an even quantity and quality of the build. Users including a French aerospace manufacturer, tell us that they detected less than half the amount of micro-cracks they have with competitor machines they have at the moment."
Staying in Asia, SLM has also signed an agreement to lead metal 3D printing in India alongside DesignTech Systems and the International Advanced Research Centre for Powder Metallurgy and New Materials (ARCI) - an Indian Government-led research organisation.
The agreement will see the collaboration establish a test and demonstration centre in Hyderabad with the aim of offering the best possible service of metal AM to Indian industry. Informally known as Cyberabad due to the prominence of companies like Google, Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Amazon, Hyderabad is one of India's key industrial centres and recently ranked second best Indian city to do business in a World Bank Group survey. A seemingly wise move to increase an already prominent presence in Asia’s second largest economy.
Enjoying the views
The Divergent Blade concept car.
During our talk, Stefan modestly said of Paris Air Show attendees, "best case scenario they already know SLM Solutions as a brand but to be honest not everyone does."
That could be set to change with the kind of exposure afforded by two of the most popular 3D printing videos on YouTube this year. Coincidentally, the first comes courtesy of the aforementioned machines installed at GE facilities. The May 2017 episode of GE's In The Wild series starring Mythbusters' Adam Savage is called, "The Power of 3D Additive Manufacturing" and has over 500,000 views. It shows several SLM machines at GE Power producing gas turbine components used to power homes across the U.S.
The second video features a story much closer to SLM's heart, at the time of writing it has only been up for a week and has already had 400,000 views. It is an episode of Jay Leno's garage featuring the 2015 Divergent Blade - the 3D printed supercar. Leno interviews Kevin Czinger, Founder and CEO of Divergent 3D, on the company’s use of an SLM 500 to produce the majority of the concept car’s frame.
Earlier this year SLM Solutions deepened its relationship with Divergent 3D beyond the usual machine supplier into a strategic partnership that will see SLM create bespoke hardware and software for the Divergent Manufacturing Platform. The partnership is intended to allow Divergent 3D scale up to mass production. There is already a cooperation with PSA Group (manufacturer of the “Peugeot” and “Citroën” brands) and that was pre-Leno's Garage...
3D printed skeleton of the Divergent 3D concept car.
SLM Solutions is a prominent partner in several of these blue-sky thinking automotive projects such as the Divergent 3D one, or the printing of wheels for the Audi Lunar Quattro, or the creation of entirely new tyre moulds (featured later on in this Issue on page 17) and Stefan believes these project show that the technology is now at a point to truly live up to the promise he first saw in the late 90s:
“We want this technology to be part of everyday continuous production; part one has to be the same as part 750. Only now with the improvements in speed and with features like the new gas flow system are people starting to see what can be done.”
