3D Printing & Cargo: Threat or opportunity?

Just getting started

In the three decades since the dawn of 3D printing, the world has seen “countless disruptive technologies,” said Alan Amling, vice president of marketing for UPS Global Logistics & Distribution. Some – like smart phones – stuck around and continue to shape the way we live and communicate. Others – like pagers – shook things up for a while but quickly slipped into oblivion as more compelling innovations edged them out.

“3D printing, however, is a different kind of disruption,” Amling added. “It’s a slow burner, but it’s one that promises to revolutionize how we design and manufacture products. It’s hard to tell exactly what role 3D printing eventually will take in manufacturing. But we’re confident that it’s going to make an impact. That’s why air cargo and logistics companies should start exploring the potential now, if they haven’t already.”

Some of the more immediate effects could be a reduction in air cargo’s market share for the rapid transport of prototypes, aerospace and automotive sub-assemblies, spare parts, mold tools, electronics assemblies and consumer products, and other high-value, time-critical goods. 3DP will pave the way for accelerated re-shoring, near-shoring and right-shoring of manufacturing, allowing goods to be manufactured closer to the end user and requiring less lead time and a shorter supply chain.

That’s the potential bad news for the freight forwarding industry that has relied on the jet engine as its maximum rate of speed for the last half a century. The good news, for the air logistics industry, is that 3DP is still feeling growing pains – pains that center on cost, quality, materials, size and speed issues, at least for the medium term of five to ten years (see sidebar).

Taking the initiative

The wiser freight forwarders and express firms that see the on-demand writing on the wall are taking advantage of 3DP’s slow evolution and deciding that they, too, can be disruptors in their own right. With enough printing media, forwarders of the future may be able to forego traditional shipping as well and 3D-print some “deliveries” themselves.

UPS and DHL, for instance, are already taking their first exploratory strides with this technology and have installed 3D printers in their respective research centers to see how they may be integrated into their operations.

UPS partnered in May of 2015 with a company providing 3DP services to the consumer products, packaging, aerospace, automotive, transportation and medical industries. “We invested in a startup called CloudDDM, which hosts a 3D printer facility – about 100 printers so far – at our global air hub in Louisville, Kentucky,” said UPS’ Amling. “Customers upload their designs to CloudDDM and then select quantity, material type, color and print priority. CloudDDM can produce those parts late into the evening and pass them to UPS for nextday delivery. A lot of people and companies are already benefiting from this unique partnership.”

Amling says that once UPS has the 3DP service bureau model right, the company will expand it to their global operations.

DHL has also installed 3D printers at its DHL Innovation Center in Troisdorf, Germany, and the new Asia Pacific Innovation Center, which opened in late 2015.  “The objective of the DHL Innovation Centers is to maintain that lead by developing highly innovative products and services based on technological, social and logistics trends of the future,” said Bill Meahl, chief commercial officer for DHL. “The DHL Trend Research team continuously analyzes and identifies new developments and their potential impact on the logistics industry along the entire value chain.”

For the last three years, forwarder Panalpina has worked with the Cardiff Business School, at Cardiff University in Wales, to find new data-driven ways to make their processes more efficient. In January of this year, the team collaborated with the Cardiff School of Engineering to focus on new manu facturing technologies in order to help Panalpina’s customers identify the right products that could be switched from traditional to additive manufacturing techniques, such as 3D printing.

“We have a supply chain specialist and an engineer working together with leading experts at Cardiff Business School,” says Mike Wilson, global head of logistics at Panalpina. “The findings of this exciting new project will find their way into our wider offering of Logistics Manufacturing Services, which has already successfully transformed the manufacturing and logistics strategy of important Panalpina high-tech customers.”