This week across additive manufacturing: Defense sector scales metal additive manufacturing capacity; Aerospace industry advances multi-material metal printing; Desktop FDM/FFF market adopts modular and automated hardware.
Defense sector scales metal additive manufacturing capacity
Major defense primes and agencies contracted manufacturers like AML3D, DEEP Manufacturing, and Applied Rapid Technologies to establish serial metal AM production for naval, missile, and military spare parts.
Applied Rapid Technologies has been named a prime contractor under the Defense Logistics Agency’s $10 million Joint Additive Manufacturing Acceptance (JAMA) pilot program. The contract tasks the company with producing flight-safety-critical and mission-essential components using the Defense Department’s Internet Bid Board System to manage product definitions and acceptance criteria.
Separately, AML3D secured a contract to produce US Navy submarine spare parts using its proprietary Wire Additive Manufacturing (WAM) technology. This follows a previous agreement announced March 17, 2026, in which the company contracted to supply four ARCEMY X systems to HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding facility, with full operational capacity scheduled for the third quarter of fiscal year 2027.
DEEP Manufacturing has established a 50,000 sq ft Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing (WAAM) facility in Houston, Texas, backed by a $10 million investment plan. The site, which opens May 6, 2026, will utilize four robotic systems to produce industrial components in Inconel 625 and carbon steel. The company is currently targeting DNV certification for pressure-rated vessels produced at the location.
Divergent Technologies has also entered a contract to manufacture cruise missile components using its Divergent Adaptive Production System (DAPS). The project involves the use of laser powder bed fusion to produce high-strength aluminum and titanium structures for aerospace hardware.
Aerospace industry advances multi-material metal printing
Fraunhofer, ARIS, and University of Limerick partnered with industry players to adopt multi-material laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) and optimized metallurgy to consolidate complex propulsion components.
Fraunhofer IGCV has developed a multi-material laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) process capable of integrating magnetic and non-magnetic steel within a single build run. Part of the 38 million Euro European Union-funded Enlighten project, the process employs a molybdenum interlayer to manage metallurgical compatibility between dissimilar metals, such as titanium and nickel. This technique is designed to eliminate secondary assembly steps, such as welding or mechanical fastening, for complex propulsion components like rocket valves.
Separately, the Academic Space Initiative Switzerland (ARIS) has completed development of its PEGASUS Gen1 rotating detonation engine, which targets 1 kN of thrust. The engine’s cooling channels and intricate geometries were produced using a copper-nickel-silicon alloy via LPBF, with testing support from industry partners Feramic AG, LEUKA GmbH, and Schmelzmetall. Cold flow testing is currently in progress, with live firing tests scheduled to follow.
In the commercial sector, The Exploration Company signed a five-year licensing agreement with LEAP 71 to utilize the Noyron RP computational engineering model for autonomous design of rocket engine geometries. This software integration will be applied to the company's Typhoon engine program. Meanwhile, Rocket Lab is transitioning its internal LPBF production workflows from the Rutherford engine to the larger Archimedes engine for the Neutron launch vehicle, focusing on the scale-up of Inconel and titanium alloy components.
Academic research continues to address specific metallurgical constraints in additive manufacturing. UCL researchers have developed a hypereutectic aluminum alloy engineered for directed energy deposition (DED) that utilizes a narrow freezing range to reduce solidification cracking, reporting a 70% increase in yield strength over AlSi10Mg. Additionally, Croom Medical has formalized a partnership with the University of Limerick to model how metal plasticity and microstructure affect the fatigue life of Ti-6Al-4V and steel components in aerospace applications.
Desktop FDM/FFF market adopts modular and automated hardware
Manufacturers including Creality, MOVA, and Mintion introduced hardware designed for automated nozzle cleaning, material swapping, and air filtration, targeting professionalized desktop workflows.
Desktop FDM/FFF hardware manufacturers are increasingly deploying modular and automated components to address bottlenecks in material management, maintenance, and air quality. This week, MOVA AtomForm launched the Palette 300, a $2,000 desktop printer featuring the proprietary OmniElement Automatic Nozzle Swapping System, which utilizes 12 individual nozzles to facilitate multi-material and multi-color printing. The system supports up to 12 materials and 36 colors, an architectural choice intended to reduce the purge-related material waste common in single-nozzle, multi-spool feeding systems.
Creality has similarly focused on hardware-level maintenance, filing a patent for a multi-module print head designed to swap entire extrusion assemblies. This follows the company's recent patent filing for a mechanical cleaning station intended to automate nozzle wiping and reduce cross-contamination. These developments represent a move to formalize proprietary hardware solutions for tasks that have historically relied on manual intervention or external third-party modifications.
In the secondary accessory market, Mintion introduced the V1 air filtration system, a 66.95 Euro external unit. The device employs a three-stage process—pre-filter, HEPA H13, and activated carbon—to mitigate emissions such as styrene and caprolactam from desktop printers. The unit features a 100-mm connection interface, enabling compatibility across multiple printer brands, and is specifically marketed for professionalized desktop workflows where industrial-grade ventilation is unavailable.
These hardware-centric updates coincide with the ongoing integration of automated material handling as a standard consumer feature, as seen in the market traction of the Bambu Lab A1 Combo. While individual manufacturers are pursuing different technical paths—ranging from multi-nozzle revolver systems to modular print heads—the commonality across these announcements is the prioritization of unattended machine operation and reduced user maintenance.
This Week in Brief
Product & Technology
- IBM — IBM filed a patent for a dual-nozzle FFF system to fill cavities with loose particles for localized property adjustment.
- Scrap — Scrap Labs released the Scrap 1 metal LPBF printer priced at $17,990 with a 100 mm cubic build volume.
- Continuum Powders — Continuum Powders will showcase its reclaimed metal powders at the 2026 Defense Manufacturing Conference.
- Sculpteo — Sculpteo launched a 3D scanning service at its Paris facility to create print-ready files from physical parts.
- Facturee — Facturee integrated an AI matching engine to connect buyers with over 2,000 certified European manufacturing partners.
- KSF Institute — KSF Institute is researching AM methods for producing resin-bonded diamond grinding tools.
- Evo3D — Evo3D published a technical analysis focusing on SLS production efficiency and total lifecycle costs.
- Rice University — Rice University researchers developed the ATLAS platform using 3D printed superhydrophobic microwell arrays for cancer study.
- CONTEXT — The AMPOWER report valued the 2025 industrial AM market at over €11 billion, growing 5.6%.
- 3D LabPrint — 3D LabPrint RC aircraft models show improved quality from a decade of FDM/FFF hardware advancements.
- Bambu Lab — Bambu Lab P1S users reported filament failures with ColorFabb LW-PLA due to heat creep in the closed chamber.
- Kind Designs — Florida Senate Bill 302 streamlined approvals for Kind Designs' 3D printed living seawalls using state funding.
- ICON — ICON began constructing 10 barracks at Fort Bliss using 10 Vulcan robots in an $87 million project.
Partnership
- Würth Additive Group — Würth Additive Group partnered with B9Creations to integrate DLP technology into its digital manufacturing platform.
M&A / Corporate
- Bant Dental — Bant Dental digitized its UK lab using a Stratasys J5 DentaJet printer for full-color dental prosthetics.
- 3D Systems — 3D Systems secured EU MDR certification for its NextDent Jetted Denture Solution for a summer 2026 launch.
Compiled from 39 sources across AMPulse's news index. Week 14 of 2026.