We talk about Rapid Manufacturing, Direct Manufacturing or E-manufacturing when we make production parts directly without using tooling. For this we use rapid prototyping resources but under production conditions (traceability, repeatability, new materials).

This is a new way of envisaging producing parts or sets of parts.

To make it possible:

• The use of rapid prototyping resources
  E.g. flame retardant polyamide powder (SLS)
• The application of stricter manufacturing procedures
  E.g. traceability
• Re-designing parts to adapt them to a new production method
  E.g. the manufacture of one-piece parts is possible.

INITIAL is equipped and structured with a pro-active approach for the development of this concept.