3D printing platform to ‘revolutionise’ spare parts supply

An Innovate UK-backed start-up will launch a ground-breaking digital marketplace for 3D printable car parts.

Autentica Car Parts has developed a platform that allows OEMs to sell spare parts designs to authorised dealers, distributors, and repair centres.

This will enable instant access to spare car parts compared to the industry standard of 28 days, while at the same time reducing non-production costs like storage by 70% and the carbon footprint of transportation by 40%.

The platform, developed in partnership with the University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC) and cloud technology company Oracle, has been successfully tested with 500 customers and an international network of 600 3D-printing service providers.

Irma Gilbert, CEO of Autentica Car Parts, said: “The aftermarket in the automotive spare parts supply chain globally is facing several perennial challenges, such as costly warehouse storage of spare parts; high logistics costs due to time-intensive production and shipping; and low-risk resilience due to cross-border transport which can affect delivery times significantly.

“Digital technologies are catalysts in delivering a radical transformation to global supply chains by leveraging, among others, the power of automation, analytics and intelligence to improve efficiency, visibility, sustainability and resilience.

“Over the last two years we have developed a web platform which combines three major digital technologies – additive manufacturing, distributed ledger and artificial intelligence – to help revolutionise the aftermarket and automotive spare parts supply chain.”