It is a recent industry, small but not marginal, that worldwide bills 15,000 million dollars a year; they are still far from the estimated potential. It is not that it is something exceptional, but 3D printing –called additive manufacturing– has lived since its inception more dependent on hardware than on the development of the applications in which its true value resides. In 2016, HP –the undisputed leader in conventional printing– launched this line of business with a global epicenter at its Sant Cugat campus. There it employs 1,500 people (700 of them researchers) of 62 nationalities and generates 150 patents a year.
Despite this relevance, HP does not break down the turnover of this activity or what is the percentage of the 19,000 million dollars that its Printing division entered in 2022. In return, it provides data that may be more representative: over six years, its customers have manufactured some 170 million parts using HP 3D printing equipment; of them, just over 70 million in 2022, which gives an idea of ??the acceleration in demand.
Until last year, HP’s technology, backed by a thousand of its own patents, focused on industrial polymers. That’s when he added metal printing, a fastest growing market segment, to plastic. Ramon Pastor, who was first responsible for this business, has gone on to lead this most promising branch globally, which starts with metallic powders as raw material and is characterized by growth of more than 20% per year in value. There is no reason, according to him, for the percentage not to be maintained for years.
HP 3D printers are on an industrial scale, they are not desktop computers like those that have popularized the figure of the so-called makers; its clients are large companies and manufacturing contractors. “The objective has been refined – explains Pastor – to capture complex geometries that require customization depending on their application to a specific final use. In order for a diversity of vertical industries to acquire these capabilities, it is essential to develop specific applications, which is why we have set ourselves the task of creating software solutions and assuming an active role, including training, guiding them to those industries”.
Traditional plastic manufacturing is quite efficient, but it can be replaced with advantages, while metal manufacturing is usually inefficient for various reasons, including the need to assemble parts that, in 3D printing, can be made from a single piece. This has consequences not only on cost but also on the minimum quantity to produce, transport and the supply chain.
This industrial bet makes sense because “there is no metallurgical process that offers efficiencies equivalent to those of injection molding in a thermoplastic.” Historically, in metal there has been little innovation in production processes. Complex geometries – a key concept – can be achieved faster and at lower cost in a single step that replaces three or more successive ones, until a 3D part is achieved. Advantages are achieved such as the optimization of inventories to the market size for a certain piece”.
You have to look beyond the products, concludes Pastor. “If we only thought about them, we would do what the client asks, sure, but the demand would grow slowly. If we want it to grow faster, we have to look for solutions –software– that act as accelerators. Having the best hardware and getting the best products is not enough, you have to promote the applications”.