Automotive 3D Printing Market - Growth, Trends, COVID-19 Impact, and Forecasts (2021 - 2026)

The FDM is among the most commonly used method of 3D printing in the automotive industry. The flexibility of the method to be used for manufacturing of the prototypes, concept model parts, and also final products helps it in maintaining a significant share in the automotive 3D printing market. This computer-aided method derives inputs from a processing unit for the model, which it has to print and starts the printing process bottom up. Materials, like thermoplastics, are generally used in the process, which results in the ultra-light final products. Advanced high-performance engineering grade thermoplastics can also be used in the process, which produces a tough, strong, and incredibly light products.

The supporting ecological impacts of the process, such as the minimal wastage and negligible carbon footprint, are also supporting the process to be mass adopted by the industry. Recent advancements in the FDM technology, which makes it compatible to 3D print parts with materials, such as carbon fiber and carbon fiber reinforced plastics, make the process even more essential to the automakers. The growing stringency of the automotive regulatory authorities started the race of manufacturing a light and safe vehicle. In order to manufacture such vehicles, the automobile manufacturers are turning their heads toward the exotic materials, such as carbon fibers. The ability of the FDM method to 3D print automotive parts of carbon fiber helps the automakers in reducing the manufacturing cost and time and also in decreasing the ecological impacts of other manufacturing processes.

Many automotive manufacturing giants, such as Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Tesla, Audi, Koenigsegg, Shelby, etc. have already embraced the 3D printing technology in the manufacturing process.

North America and Europe dominates the market owing to the presence of large number of OEM manufacturers who contributes a large share of their revenue in research and development. The automotive industry in Germany accounts for majority of the R&D spending, with a share of over 35%.  The major automotive manufacturers in the region are Volkswagen, BMW, Ford, etc.

India is expected to show a healthy rise in Automotive 3d printing market during forecast period due to various factors such as entry of major players in the market, developed chemical industry, government initiatives, availability of skilled labor and cheap raw materials.

However, in South Korea and Japan, automotive vehicle production has seen a drop of 20% thus leading to a subsequent decrease in demand for 3d printing. This steadied the growth of the market. .