Takeaways from a day at Inside 3D Printing Mumbai 2017

In this report, Industrial Laser Solutions Editorial Advisor Anant Deshpande presents his takeaways from the 3rd Inside 3D Printing Mumbai trade fair in India.

The 3rd Inside 3D Printing Mumbai trade fair, produced by CNT Expositions and Services LLP, was held December 1-2, 2017, at Nehru Centre in Mumbai, India. The event drew over 1900 attendees across India, with participation from companies like Imaginarium, EOS, Renishaw, Wipro 3D, Stratasys, 3Dsystem, SLM, Concept Laser, and others.

Related: The industrial laser market in India

The 3D printing market is growing day by day the world over, and so is the case in India. In 2015, the approximate size of the addressable manufacturing market for additive manufacturing was $13 trillion, while the market share of additive manufacturing was $5 billion. Boston Consulting Group forecasts that it will grow at a compound annual rate of almost 30% through 2020. According to Aditya Chandavarkar, Partner - CNT, "Additive manufacturing is getting a lot of traction in India and many companies are working on moving into functional part manufacturing using additive manufacturing compared to only prototyping."

Inside 3D Printing Mumbai was organized to catalyze 3D printing technology across various application sectors—this year, they held a conference on the introduction of metal additive manufacturing, with participation from key metal additive manufacturing OEMs and industry experts from EOS, Renishaw, GE Additive, Materialise, Wipro 3D, and AMCG. The conference sessions opened with a double keynote from Autodesk and HP, bringing global insights to the audience. The knowledge sharing conference track focused on Manufacturing, Medical.

Since the trade fair was held in Mumbai, it was easily accessible for application industries such as automotive, heavy engineering, tooling, and packaging, to name a few. However, the show also saw visitors from across India travel to understand how 3D printing impacts their respective businesses, validating the importance of a dedicated 3D printing trade fair.

Spread over two halls, with the presence of all the key stakeholders, the show provided a comprehensive insight into current state of the Indian 3D printing industry, recent developments, and products across technology and application.

CNT has been actively promoting 3D and organizing activities that are industry-targeted, such as plastics, tooling, molding, automotive, engineering, consumer appliances, toys, industrial applications, and packaging.

Inside 3D Printing Mumbai featured a Materials Pavilion, as materials are an important and under-estimated aspect of 3D printing. The idea of curating the Materials Pavilion was to provide a dedicated space for the various players in the materials supply chain to be present. The Materials Pavilion included Solvay Engineering Plastics, Creomer, Naturtec, Rever Industries, and Greenway Tech.

"Our aim at CNT, with the successful established Inside 3D Printing Mumbai event and our other neutral knowledge sharing platforms, is to provide a conducive environment for 3D printing technology to proliferate and grow in India," explains Dilip Raghavan, partner at CNT Expositions and Services.

The next Inside 3D Printing Mumbai show will take place December 19-20, 2018, at the Nehru Centre in Mumbai.