New report analyzes opportunity for traditional and technical ceramics AM

A new report titled, “3D Printing of Technical and Tradition Ceramic for Part Production: a Ten Year Forecast and Opportunity Analysis” projects the yearly value of AM manufactured parts in several segments of industrial manufacturing and end-use consumer products to surpass $2 billion by 2027, driving the overall Ceramics AM segment to over $3 billion in generated revenues and value, including AM hardware, materials and services. This scenario is dependent on several key trends, which are expected to take place during the forecast period, in terms of ceramics AM adoption by large international manufacturers.

Members of the press can receive an executive summary and schedule an interview with the report’s author, Davide Sher.

About the Report:

This new report quantifies the projected value of ceramics additive manufactured parts taking into consideration both technical and traditional ceramic materials. It identifies the most commercially relevant technologies capable of processing these materials, while also providing a forecast of material-specific revenue opportunities, services and end-use parts/products.

The analysis includes ten-year forecasts for all these segments of ceramics AM which is – together with polymers, composites and metals – the fourth large, horizontal family of materials which can be processed through AM technologies, thus offering unprecedented capabilities in terms of manufacturing. Ceramics are among the first materials used for manufacturing and they are currently widely adopted in several industrial manufacturing segments, with overall estimated revenues between $10 and 100 billion in 2016 (depending by the source). Nevertheless, they are still in the very beginning of their adoption cycle in AM and while their potential is very significant it will depend on specific policies implemented by large industrial adopters.

Taking into consideration all these factors, the report details the revenue opportunity in the best and worst-case scenario, breaking each revenue opportunity segment down by geographic locations (North America, Europe, Asia Pacific and Rest of the World). In order to provide the most accurate overall market picture extensive interviews were conducted with market-leading operators, including hardware manufacturers, materials manufacturers, academic experts and first industrial adopters.

Key firms in the ceramic AM segment include: 3DCeram, Lithoz, Admatec, Prodways, Tethon3D, Steinbach, XJet, Desamanera, Additive Elements, WASP, Vorm Vrij, Emerging Objects, Materialise, Shapeways, Exonal, voxeljet, DDM Systems, HRL, DKG.

The report includes an in-depth analysis of the current and potential vertical adoption segments for ceramics AM including: Aerospace, Defense, Automotive, Rail, Marine, Electronics/Optics, Energy, Medical, and Biomedical, Dental, Industrial Manufacturing, Tooling, Molds, Art/Design and Consumer Products.

From the Report:

• Ceramics AM is a niche market within the still relatively small additive manufacturing industry. The future size of the market will depend on adoption rates by large industrial groups, as described in the two scenarios considered by this report.

• This best-case scenario would result in steady growth for the short-term future, followed by very rapid adoption in the second half of the forecast period, when several of the current technical challenges for ceramics AM are overcome. In this scenario the overall market for ceramics AM, including sales of hardware, materials, AM services and overall AM part value is expected to top $3 billion by 2027.

• In the best-case scenario, the forecasted implementation of technical ceramic materials for production of end-use parts will drive technical ceramics AM materials to grow into a very significant revenues opportunity, totaling $127 million in yearly sales by the end of the forecast period.
• Powder based ceramics for AM mainly consist of traditional ceramic materials (90%) and are expected to grow into a $110 million yearly revenue opportunity by the end of the forecast period.