Dutch chemical company Royal DSM is restructuring its additive manufacturing (AM) business by aligning all its AM activities within its Materials cluster and promoting a partnership approach.
Described by the company as a “customer-centric” approach, DSM’s restructuring involves the formation of an integrated business – DSM Additive Manufacturing – which encompasses all of DSM’s AM activities, including its Somos business in resins for stereolithography (SLA) and digital light processing (DLP).
Additionally, the business will offer fused filament fabrication (FFF) as well as experience achieved from years of research in selective laser sintering (SLS), multi jet fusion, ink jet and binder jet processes.
“By aligning all [our] AM activities within the Materials cluster and promoting a partnership approach, we can provide customers an open and flexible infrastructure,” DSM said in a statement. “This will help customers to find exactly the right materials and production systems for their applications.”
“AM is quickly evolving from a prototyping technology on the fringes of manufacturing into a mainstream discipline, offering tangible value and economically viable benefits to large industrial companies and eventually through to end-users,” Hugo da Silva, VP of Additive Manufacturing at DSM, said in the statement. “Mass customization and small volume production using AM are now a reality, and as the sector evolves and matures to reflect new, disruptive business models and shifting customer behaviours, so must we. SLA is our heritage; however we can play in all polymer printing technologies, we can deliver in all areas.”
DSM already has various collaborations throughout the AM sector; it’s recent “One DSM” framework technology partnership agreement with Toyota Motorsport GmbH involves all DSM businesses active in supplying materials and technology to the automotive sector – Somos, Engineering Plastics, and also Dyneema ultrahigh molecular weight polyethylene fibre.
