Public Funding for Ai Build Limited

**AdCast** is a radical approach to reduce the loss of high-value metal-cast products in two key areas: in the foundry and in the field. 5% of castings are scrapped as unrepairable, due to defects, generating thousands of tonnes scrap globally per year. A further 20% of defective castings are re-heated and manually repaired using large amounts of gas. To achieve this game-changing advance three technologies will be combined for the first time: **Directed Energy Deposition** (DED) to deposit metal repairs on challenging high-chrome cast substrates. **Metal wire feedstock for DED,** optimised for the repair of high chrome-content white iron castings, notoriously hard and difficult to repair. **AI-assisted** **software.** 3D scanning will compare defect to nominal CAD shape and automatically generate the 3D additive weld path and calibrate to the target casting location. This **Additive Repair (AdR)** approach will change the repair of high-specification cast structures (in the foundry and in the field) from a risky, resource-intensive operation **taking days** of oven heating and manual labour with variable results and poor financial viability, to an intelligent, self-improving and efficient operation **taking hours**, requiring no pre-heating. The presence of industry experts is key: * Weir Minerals, a global manufacturing company, with drive to improve sustainability and resource efficiency by reducing foundry scrap and offering repair/refurbishment services. * AiBuild has AI-based CNC simulation and analysis tools adapted to DED operations that will be leveraged to provide rapid repair calibration and automated repair routines. * MTC has advanced laser-based AM systems with skills in real-time monitoring and inspection to optimise quality and speed. By providing the technology for refurbishment and repair cells globally, AdCast will significantly impact global resource efficiency and benefit UK plc by the export of a world-leading products and services.

Large Format Additive Manufacturing (LFAM) is a developing technology with a steadily increasing foothold within commercial manufacturing that enables the creation of **large-volume polymer/plastic components with high printing outputs**. It is an exciting proposition with the potential to deliver impactful and wide-ranging economic, environmental, and social benefits, and conservative estimation is for a global market worth £1b by 2025\. Currently, the UK only secures ~5% of the global AM market, however, conclusions from a recent, comprehensive market analysis suggest that an exploitable opportunity exists for LFAM to significantly improve this situation. The existing commercial LFAM market is comprised of overseas-manufactured machines, and these mainly have operational complexity, slow build times, limited material range, and poor-quality products, which precludes widespread adoption. Better-performing offerings are prohibitively expensive. The UK has no LFAM machine manufacturing capability, whilst leading competitors have this advantage. The EVO-ONE project has been scoped to comprehensively address challenges to securing a market-leading position through designing, manufacturing, and constructing **a technologically advanced LFAM** **3D printer system (EVO-ONE)** and taking the platform to TRL 6\. EVO-ONE offers unique advantages: * **Affordable purchase and operation costs** * **Faster productivity** * **Quality products** * **Reliability** * **Increased capability** * **Ergonomic, easy to use** * **Adaptability/flexibility** * **Minimised waste, energy, and emissions** * **Wide range of recycled material feedstock** The realisation of this advanced system will provide UK stakeholders with proprietary capability, enabling EVO-3D to exploit the **high integrity/high-value manufacturing sectors, with an estimated £300m worth.** The consortium benefits from well-established partner relations and has the prerequisite skills, knowledge, expertise, and experience to achieve success: * **EVO-3D** machine design and manufacture * **AiBuild** CAM software developer * **Filamentive** recycled feedstock identification, qualification, supply * **NMIS** Additive Manufacturing, polymer material testing, and routes to exploitation/ commercialisation expertise * **Rolls-Royce and Baker Hughes** end-use-case provision, continuous feedback during the development stage to de-risk progressive activity, ensure commercial success

Project **COMPASS** is a collaboration between Domin and Ai Build (AIB) to help Domin scale their additive manufacturing (AM) based manufacturing processes and address demand in the global hydraulics industry. Domin are not only disrupting this industry but also, by exploiting their energy-efficient products, want to help the industry save 1B tonnes CO2e/year in 2030\. Domin bring expertise in additive manufacturing, quality control and IIoT/connectivity while AIB bring strong expertise around AI / machine vision based software for making AM more efficient. Their application of AI, data science for process analysis and IIoT/connectivity is expected to scale Domin's production capacity, and yield strong improvements in resource efficiency (21.19 tonnes material, 34.65 tonnes CO2e) and energy efficiency (937.71 MWh, 218.39 tonnes CO2e) over three years from project completion. Domin will also accelerate the development of IIoT-enabled AM quality control tools for high speed fatigue testing and AM metal depowdering, which will help global companies adopt and scale AM within their ecosystem. The project outcomes are expected to contribute significant Gross Value Add (GVA) to the hydraulics and AM sectors. Further, the consortium will create 7-11 digital technology jobs in the UK during the project, with the scope to create 100s of further new jobs within the following 5 years. As AM gains traction across global industries, COMPASS will 'show the way' and contribute to the UK's position as a centre-of-excellence in using industrial digital technologies for sustainable manufacturing and AM adoption at scale.

AiBuild is a UK-based SME which offers CAM and process control software (AiSync) for large-format polymer additive manufacturing (AM). AiBuild is seeking funding from InnovateUK to develop a novel infill generation feature for AiSync to enable the additive manufacture of thermally-stable composite moulds, unlocking the cost and lead-time savings of AM over existing mould-manufacturing processes.