VoxelMatters predicts explosive growth in automotive additive manufacturing over the next decade.
In the history of 3D print technology many different applications have been attempted. Many did not end up having the right combination of function and value, but over time several profitable areas were identified. Today, printing dental appliances, aerospace parts, one-part rocket engines and a few more have become the standard approaches in those industries.
One area that’s long been expected to make much more use of additive technologies has been the automotive sector. However, up to now there has been relatively slow adoption.
This is likely because implementation is complex. Automotive products involve vast numbers of parts, often delivered via long chains of suppliers and sub-suppliers. This has made it challenging for automakers to perform larger scale transitions to additive manufacturing.
However, similar to other key AM applications, over time things get sorted. VoxelMatters has issued their first research report on the automotive industry’s use of AM, and the results are quite surprising.
While they measure the current value of AM in automotive to be around US$2.7B today, they forecast it could grow to a whopping US$32.8B by 2034. That’s a compound annual growth rate of 28.4%.
VoxelMatters’ Davide Sher writes:
“This expansion reflects the automotive sector’s gradual but decisive shift from prototyping and tooling to end-use part production. Tooling, jigs, fixtures, and production aids are rapidly gaining traction, while serial and even mass-production applications are beginning to emerge.”
They see growth happening in both metal and polymer AM for automotive. While today polymer usage exceeds that of metal, they believe the use of metal applications will at some point in the next decade be the dominant AM material.
The implication here is that if large amounts of AM are to occur in the future, automakers had better focus on using the technology now. It takes many years to get applications up to speed, and falling behind means they may risk being noncompetitive in the future.
Via VoxelMatters
