Every year at the Formnext expo in Frankfurt, the most cutting-edge additive manufacturing technologies, materials, software and applications from around the world are showcased. The event, perhaps more than any other in the additive world, functions as something of a microcosm of the industry and gives us an indication of how the AM industry has advanced and, importantly, where it is going.
One of the highlights of the annual additive manufacturing trade show, which gives fascinating and vital insight into what’s on the additive manufacturing horizon, is the Formnext Start-Up Challenge. Every year, the challenge recognizes and awards some of the most innovative startups working across the industry.
Since the winners of the Formnext Start-Up Challenge 2019 were announced at the beginning of September, we’ve wanted to learn more about their respective technologies and to hear what they have to say about winning the acclaimed competition.
AdditiveLab BVBA
Belgium-based AdditiveLab was selected as a winner of the Formnext Start-Up Challenge because of its simulation software platform for metal 3D printed parts. As co-founder Mariam Mir explained: “AdditiveLab is a novel software solution that is currently the only platform that enables creation of customized models for additive manufacturing processes simulation.”
The company offers a selection of products, including AdditiveLab Research, a software for advanced simulation engineers, and AdditiveLab Lite, a cost-effective and user friendly product for CAD and CAM engineers with less simulation experience.
Formnext Start-Up Challenge 2019
Mir continued: “With AdditiveLab we provide a unique, efficient and scalable AM process simulation solution in the market that addresses the needs of a broad range of users enabling them to solve AM production challenges with different levels of complexity.”
As we know, winning the Formnext Start-Up Challenge comes with more than just the title: the event offers a range of support and exposure opportunities to the challenge winners. For AdditiveLab, winning the challenge will have an important impact on how it evolves.
“Several of the companies that started out in the Formnext Start-up Area turned into established and sustainable players in the AM field. It is a great honor for us to follow that path,” Mir told us. “The unique opportunity for us to participate this year in the Formnext Startup-Area will increase our product exposure in the AM market and provides a great opportunity to demonstrate the value of our solutions to potential collaborators and users.
“We are looking forward to a great amount of visitor exposure to present our novel product AdditiveLab, the most customizable AM simulation software solution to understand, predict, and optimize manufacturing outcomes.”
Exponential Technologies Ltd.
Latvian startup Exponential Technologies stood out amongst the many startups in the AM industry for its AI-powered software which helps to optimize the additive manufacturing process through materials.
“In additive manufacturing, finding the right process parameters is extremely complex and can several months or years,” said CEO Matthias Kaiser about the inspiration behind the company. “This of course makes this process also extremely expensive, which is a main reason for the small amount of materials that are available in the additive market. We will change that by introducing our software solution xT smart_DoE to speed up the search for process parameters, typically by a factor of 10. We achieve this by using our unique small data artificial intelligence algorithms in combinations with our Research Management System (RMS).”
Formnext Start-Up Challenge 2019
Formnext Start-Up Challenge 2019
“To speed up the development of new material compositions, the newest version of our software also allows the optimization of mixture type problems,” he added. “What makes our solution unique on the market is that we can optimize process parameters and material compositions at the same time, which allows rapid development of new materials with specific properties.”
Winning the Formnext Start-Up Challenge will present unique opportunities for the company both at the upcoming exhibition and beyond. As Kaiser told us:
“We already see increased interest in our solution since the winners of this year’s challenge were announced. Very important for us is also the chance to exhibit at Formnext with our own booth. This is especially important for us, as we are launching our products xT smart_DoE and xT edge, our on-premise solution at Formnext. Having a booth will allow us to get directly in contact with potential customers and partners and get feedback from the industry. We hope to gain many new customers and pilot projects with partners within the AM industry and beyond.”
LMI – Laser Melting Innovations
Based in Germany, LMI – Laser Melting Innovation
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