3DOS, AeroEdge Collaborate for Decentralized Manufacturing in Japan

A distributed manufacturing network poses many challenges: Quality assurance, version control and IP protection for traveling files, among other considerations, all have to be addressed for such a network to be realized. But perhaps the more fundamental challenge is finding and developing the manufacturing capacity to actually carry out the distributed production. One company working on many of the former problems has recently announced a collaboration to help address the latter.

3DOS, a platform designed to enable decentralized manufacturing, is partnering with AeroEdge to offer metal additive manufacturing in Japan. The latter company will 3D print metal components in-house on its hybrid directed energy deposition (DED) and electron beam melting (EBM) equipment, and serve as a hub to dispatch polymer 3D printing work to other local partners.

Founded in 2016, AeroEdge is primarily an aerospace manufacturer and supplies critical components including titanium aluminum turbine blades for the LEAP engine through a direct contract with Safran Aircraft Engines of France. The company’s capabilities include CNC machining equipment and advanced inspection technologies as well as AM machines including the GE Additive A2X EBM platform and the Lasertech65 DED hybrid from DMG MORI.

3DOS builds on the success of 3DPrinterOS, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) cloud solution used for 3D printer management by some large organizations, including NASA, Google and John Deere, as well as more than 100 universities around the world. The software allows users to send 3D print jobs to networked printers and remotely monitor their progress. 3DOS users can order 3D printed parts in a similar fashion, with the work automatically dispatched to an appropriate manufacturing node.

As a partner within the 3DOS decentralized manufacturing network, AeroEdge will now serve as one of these nodes and help to introduce the platform to the Japanese manufacturing market. As with any other 3DOS-enabled manufacturing site, customers ordering printed parts will be able to protect confidential information through digital technologies and monitor the print in real time.

“AeroEdge is the first major industrial metal AM partnership on the 3DOS platform, and we are working together to pilot and test the system,” says John Dogru, 3DOS founder and chief architect. “We are extremely excited about the partnership, signed MOU and shared vision to decentralize AM manufacturing globally.”

The two companies connected through Berkeley SkyDeck, a startup accelerator and incubator at the University of California. According to Dogru, AeroEdge and 3DOS share “the same vision for decentralized manufacturing.” AeroEdge will initially serve industries including transportation, military and the aerospace industry, including digitizing the LEAP engine blades already manufactured by the company.

“We will also push 3DPrinterOS/3DOS into the university space in Japan to train the next generation on on-demand manufacturing,” Dogru says.