Because the earliest days of additive manufacturing, the aerospace trade has been a eager adopter of the expertise. Through the years, aerospace corporations and OEMs have continued to advance and form the state of AM, taking part in a key function in its evolution from a prototyping expertise with restricted materials choices to an industrial manufacturing course of able to making essential plane parts from aerospace-grade metals and polymers. Given the wealthy historical past of the intersecting industries—and the extremely promising way forward for AM in aerospace—Formnext has chosen to highlight the aerospace trade by the framework of Formnext Trade Insights.
Greatest identified for its annual additive manufacturing expo in Frankfurt each November, Formnext additionally retains very busy all year long by its Trade Insights AM innovation hub. The initiative, which promotes expert-driven content material, real-world purposes tales and extra, is placing a particular give attention to AM in aerospace forward of its huge occasion within the fall. As a part of this focus, Formnext just lately hosted a free webinar (moderated by VoxelMatters’ very personal Davide Sher) and printed an unique white paper known as “The sky’s (not) the restrict”.
The Expertise Speak, held on July 9, 2025, invited a panel of specialists to debate the aerospace trade’s newest AM developments, progressive new options and what challenges should nonetheless be overcome to maximise the expertise’s potential. Audio system included Christoph Hauck, Member of the Government Board at toolcraft AG, Maximilian Strixner, Senior Additive Manufacturing Engineer at The Exploration Firm and Scott Sevcik, Director of Advisory Providers & Strategic Options at Wohlers Associates.
Within the “The sky’s (not) the restrict” white paper printed by Formnext, which could be accessed without spending a dime, the group presents an in depth exploration of additive manufacturing in aerospace, masking the advantages of utilizing the expertise (i.e. lightweighting by design optimization, price discount and materials effectivity), key purposes (i.e. rocket engines, inside cabin parts and structural components), the certification processes concerned in leveraging AM within the strict aerospace section and rather more.
The white paper is made up of six chapters, the final of which is a useful checklist of factors to think about when integrating AM in an aerospace context. The guidelines covers important steps, like materials certification, tight course of controls, long-term efficiency evaluation and rather more. The white paper can be chock-full of insights from aerospace and AM specialists. On the entire, it’s a digestible and extremely instructional doc that anybody all for aerospace AM ought to learn.
The Expertise Speak “AM in aviation and aerospace” and “The sky’s (not) the restrict” white paper are the primary parts in Formnext Trade Perception’s present focus, however there’s rather more to find. On the group’s aviation and aerospace webspecial, you’ll discover further assets, together with a collection of displays from the AERO AM Summit offered by Formnext this previous April. For instance, Christophe Blanc, Technical Enterprise Growth Supervisor at Materialise, offered a chat on scaling AM in aerospace, and Niccolo Giannelli, Director FDM World Enablement Stratasys, explored the corporate’s options for aerospace purposes.
After all, the primary occasion of the yr is but to return and each guests and exhibitors at Formnext 2025 in Frankfurt can count on the give attention to aviation and aerospace to proceed. For this yr’s expo, over 800 exhibitors and 30,000 guests are anticipated to point out up at Frankfurt am Principal from November 18 to 21, 2025.
“Additive Manufacturing holds main advantages for the aviation and aerospace manufacturing trade,” Formnext says. “From sooner prototyping and shorter time to market throughout improved design flexibility, lowered materials waste to light-weight development and elevated sustainability AM performs a rising half within the aerospace trade. All of the extra purpose to shine a highlight on this dynamic application-driven trade with the varied codecs of the Formnext Trade Insights. Get impressed, keep knowledgeable, and be totally ready when this key subject takes the stage at Formnext this November.”
Total, Formnext Trade Insights has put collectively a complete set of occasions and assets that cowl the whole lot from the most recent purposes of additive applied sciences in aerospace to technological developments which are shaping the way forward for the intersecting segments to the challenges that lie forward.
This text was initially printed in VoxelMatters’ VM Focus Aerospace AM eBook. Learn or obtain the total eBook without spending a dime at this hyperlink.
