The U.S. Air Force has released a success story titled Open Additive breaks barriers to metal additive manufacturing through SBIR/STTR program which highlights recent company successes enabled by the Small Business Innovative Research / Small Business Technology Transfer program.
The story highlights the commercialization of the PANDA™ Metal 3D Printing System and efforts to expand Open Additive’s LPBF technology to larger formats through $2.9M funding from the Air Force’s Commercialization Readiness Program (CRP) awarded in February 2020. As noted in the story, “the CRP funding agreement supports the company’s efforts to advance its metal additive manufacturing technology and product line to industrial scale. This effort includes developing and demonstrating a prototype quad-laser powder bed fusion platform with full user control of standard and advanced processing parameters, multi-sensor monitoring and feedback control, integrated heated build plate with 24-inch [600 mm] by 24-inch build area.”
We are very thankful for the guidance and support of the USAF SBIR/STTR office, the Air Force Research Laboratory, and our other SBIR/STTR project sponsors. Together, we’re accelerating the adoption of metal additive manufacturing!
Image: Loading of PANDA system (from US Air Force)