Vestas
Assembly Line
Vestas and Markforged
The Vestas team began researching alternative ways to improve their overall manufacturing process. Using Markforged’s cloud-based, AI-powered Digital Forge additive manufacturing platform, the company successfully launched its direct digital manufacturing (DDM) program in 2021. The program frees up manufacturing processes from relying on outside suppliers, and provides a knowledge base for collaboration.
The DDM program already includes 2000+ Vestas parts stored in a Markforged Eiger™ cloud-based digital repository. This allows employees at any Vestas location — with little to no additive manufacturing expertise — to quickly search for and print any number of fiber-reinforced composite parts on their local X7™ and composite parts on their Onyx One™ 3D printers.
According to Jeremy Haight, Principal Engineer — Additive Manufacturing & Advanced Concepts at Vestas, “Our approach is end-to-end. We provide the physical article in near real-time to a variety of places. It’s the closest thing to teleportation I think you can get.” Thanks to the repository, the Vestas team knows they will get consistent, up-to-spec parts at a moments notice, anywhere in the world, without the need for specialists at their global facilities. This has dramatically reduced shipping and freight costs, and manufacturing lead times.