3. Examples of achievements

In the case of direct manufacturing (manufacturing of final parts rather than prototypes), the main user sectors are plastics, dentistry, medicine, aerospace, aeronautics, competitive motor sports, and jewelry. In the case of prototype manufacturing, all industrial sectors are potentially represented.

In plastics processing, this technology is used to produce molds or mold parts for polymer injection molding with new internal features (thermal control channels running as close as possible to the molding surfaces). This makes it possible to obtain mass-produced parts with "good material and good process" characteristics, with productivity gains of around 20 to 40% in cycle times compared to conventional tools (figure 4 ). The material...