Leading polymer technology group OECHSLER is extending its partnership with US additive manufacturing company Carbon as the partners plan to enter into new markets.

OECHSLER is renewing contracts for 120 Carbon printers at its plant in Taicang, China.

The production area in Taicong, close to Shanghai, covers an area of 1800 square metres, making it one of the largest Carbon printing fleets in series production globally. The OECHSLER group has been operating their production site in China since 2004, but only implemented additive manufacturing there a few years ago, after a successful implementation in their Germany facility prior.

OECHSLER, based in Ansbach/Middle Franconia, Germany, brought in additive manufacturing to their Germany facility in 2016, when it began its plan to implement a global production infrastructure, a key part of the expansion of 3D printing as a future-oriented manufacturing technology.

The partnership between OECHSLER and Carbon has seen the development of products such as shoe soles and bicycle saddles and has seen the two work with US sporting goods manufacturer Riddell Sports to produce parts for American football helmets. They have also produced sports shoe midsoles for companies like Adidas.

Due to the high production capabilities, OECHSLER’s Asian site is particularly important to the strategic partnership between the two industrial pioneers. The facility received a double-digit million investment which is expected to expand the production capacity to over two million parts per year.

Phil DeSimone, Co-Founder and member of the Office of the CEO at Carbon, said: “Carbon’s Production Network partners worldwide are an essential pillar of the Carbon ecosystem. By extending our strategic partnership, we can not only further optimise our idea-to-production platform, but we can open up new markets together. We believe this is another milestone that will help companies bring better products to market in less time.”

The Carbon 3D printing platform is constantly evolving with regular updates and development and deployment of materials with the company’s “Idea-to-Production” platform, that is made available through a subscription service.

“I am convinced that in addition to financial predictability in terms of acquisition and maintenance cost, Carbon’s subscription model offers great benefits in the rapidly evolving additive manufacturing industry,” said Dr. Claudius Kozlik, CEO of OECHSLER AG. “Most importantly, continuous performance improvement through over-the-air updates.”

OECHSLER and Carbon plan to jointly open up new markets and support designers and engineers to develop products in the long term. Carbon’s technology being used with OECHSLER’s development process enable products to be developed and flexibly produced and mass produce them on one of the world’s largest 3D printer fleets.

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