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Metal AM in China
Metal Additive Manufacturing in China: An overview of systems manufacturers What’s happening in metal Additive Manufacturing in China? Quite a lot it seems; however, the extent and nature of this activity, and what can be expected from Chinese systems manufacturers in the coming years, can be unclear to Western observers. In the following report, Joseph Kowen offers a brief look into the current state of the metal AM industry in China. As well as presenting an overview of machine-related activity in this fast growing part of the world, he considers to what extent we can expect to see an increased presence of Chinese suppliers in western countries.
Additive Manufacturing in China is a hive of activity and continues to grow in action and interest from year to year. The first forays into what was then known as rapid prototyping began as early as the first half of the 1990s. Led by a select number of academic institutions, which actively followed technological developments in western countries, the Chinese Additive Manufacturing segment has flourished. Academia’s interest in the field was led by Tsinghua University, which began its research on material extrusion and sheet lamination systems. Wohlers Report, which tracks the status of AM worldwide, lists twenty-four China-based system manufacturers which were either selling or about to begin selling industrial systems as of March 2018. This is out of a total of 135 industrial AM system manufacturers worldwide, or almost 18%. The Chinese government has been proactive in encouraging the development of Additive Manufacturing. In November 2017, the Chinese
Vol. 4 No. 3 © 2018 Inovar Communications Ltd
government, led by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, announced an ‘Action Plan for Additive Manufacturing Industry Development (2017–2020)’. The government plans to turn AM in China into a $3 billion industry. Metal AM plays a big part in the plan.
A review of the metal AM industry in China, and conversations with local industry figures, indicate that there are now twenty metal AM systems manufacturers in China. An additional two companies are close to commercialising systems. This report briefly identifies and
Fig. 1 A Ti6Al4V front and rear suspension upright manufactured on a Farsoon FS271 machine (Courtesy Farsoon)
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