A Cost-Benefit Analysis of Additive Urban Manufacturing

by Igor Ivkić (University of Applied Sciences Burgenland, AT | Lancaster University, UK), Burkhard List (b&mi GmbH & Co KG) 

Traditional manufacturing means that a product is mass-produced in distant countries and then shipped long distances to customers, leaving a very large carbon footprint. In this article, we present an approach to disrupt these traditional value chains and replace them with urban manufacturing (or local production) using three-dimensional (3D) printing technology. This approach allows products to be printed locally in an environmentally friendly way, rather than being manufactured far away and flown in. At the heart of this idea is a cloud-based Manufacturing as a Service (MaaS) platform [1] that manages the entire process from online purchase to 3D printing, promoting sustainability and strengthening local economies.

In many areas, the industrial manufacture of products is characterised by resource-intensive production methods, long logistics chains, and ever-increasing over-production beyond actual demand [2]. Typically, products are conceived, designed, and developed in first-world countries, only to be mass-produced in large quantities in low-wage countries. This type of industrial production is neither environmentally friendly nor sustainable, nor does it help to strengthen local economies. Studies have shown that 27% of the environmental impact is due to the transport of these goods, and that these goods spend 90% of their production time in storage or in transit (unproductive). Furthermore, the Covid-19 pandemic has shown how dependent our society is on “offshore production” [L1] from developping countries, especially when the associated supply chain [3] is not available or functioning as usual. Another effect since the pandemic has been the conscious preference of customers for fair, regional, and sustainable products [L2].

To meet the new trend of local and sustainable purchasing in manufacturing, without resorting to “offshore production” and long supply chains, a new approach is needed [L3]. From the customer’s perspective, products should be produced locally and “on-demand”. Due to the technological advances in additive manufacturing, a wide range of products can now be produced both locally and cost-effectively using 3D printing technologies. At the heart of the MaaS approach is a Cloud Crafting Platform (CCP) that allows 3D printer operators to integrate their 3D printers online and offer 3D printing as a service. With the help of this urban CCP platform that enables MaaS, any 3D printer operator can become a local “on-demand” producer, ststrengthening the local economy and giving customers the opportunity to buy products made in their nearby urban area. Another goal of the MaaS platform is to break down traditional supply chains and manufacture products where they are purchased. This eliminates long transport routes and positively impacts the environment.

The CCP follows a serverless architecture approach based on the Function as a Service (FaaS) cloud service model, allowing both web shops and 3D printer operators to be integrated. Figure 1 shows how the CCP connects the web shop (Point of Sale) and the 3D printer operator (Point of Manufacturing). The production process is only initiated when a customer purchases a product from a web shop and selects the option to have the product manufactured (or 3D printed) locally. The CCP thus connects the web shop (Point of Sale) with the 3D printer operators (Point of Manufacturing), enabling on-demand production as opposed to traditional mass production of products. The CCP is designed to be scalable, allowing multiple web shops and 3D printer operators to be integrated.

Figure 1: A purchased product triggers the on-demand manufacturing process by sending the order to a local 3D printer operator via the CCP (adapted from [1]).

However, the platform is not limited to 3D printer integration alone; it identifies additive manufacturing using 3D printing as the first technological opportunity for on-demand production. Subsequently, additional technologies such as Computerized Numerical Control (CNC), laser cutting, plotter cutting, robotics, and augmented reality could be integrated to expand the range of what and how products could be produced. 

The CCP idea has also been published in a first position paper [1], in which we describe both the MaaS approach and its technical implementation via the cloud. Furthermore, we proposed a cost-benefit analysis including metrics [1]. The focus of the position paper was to describe the architectural building blocks of the proposed CCP, including a description of a lab environment, where the MaaS approach is divided into three zones with different responsibilities. Zone 1 contains the “Point of Purchase,” where a product is purchased by a customer. This could be a web shop connected to a CCP in Zone 2. This zone operates in the cloud and acts as a link between the customer who purchases a product (Zone 1) and the 3D printer operator who manufactures the product using 3D printers (Zone 3). The CCP in Zone 2 provides the necessary interfaces to connect both web shops and 3D printer operators, thus enabling production based on a MaaS approach. Figure 2 shows the lab environment described:

In addition to the laboratory setup, the following metrics were used in the cost-benefit analysis, where a specific product (a ring) was produced simultaneously using three different 3D printers, and the production costs were calculated based on a 1-year operational simulation in a Multi-Level Constribution Margin Accountig (CMA) scheme: 

• Metric 1: Print time per 3D print job
• Metric 2: Material usage per 3D print job
• Metric 3: Power consumption/energy cost per 3D printer
• Metric 4: Human operation time per 3D print job (post-processing time).

These metrics allow for a comparison to be made between the three 3D printers to determine which require more or less time, material, and energy (and ultimately money) to produce the same product. The lab experiment showed that the selected product could be 3D printed at a cost of €3.96 (Ultimaker 2+ Connect), €2.41 (Prusa MK4) and €1.18 (Creality MK1 MAX) in a 1-year simulation. 

These results and projections include direct labour, electricity, material costs and CCP-commission (costs) at CM I level, rent and depreciation at CM II level, local IT-infrastructure at CM III level and general overheads and profit towards an extrapolated operating profit.

Figure 2: Lab Environment for the Cost-Benefit Analysis of the MaaS Approach using the CCP (adapted from [1]).

Table 1: Multi-Level Contribution Margin Accounting Scheme used to calculate Production Costs based on a 1-Year Simulation.

In summary, by providing services for the integration of web shops (point of sale) with 3D print shops (point of manufacturing), the CCP is at the heart of future urban manufacturing. This enables both individuals and local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to become urban on-demand manufacturers of products purchased online. Similar to the Uber ecosystem, where anyone with a driver’s licence and a car can become an Uber driver, the CCP helps to connect the web shops with the local 3D production sites. In this new CCP ecosystem, the customer has the power not only to choose a product, but also to trigger on-demand production after the purchase (as opposed to mass production in traditional manufacturing), thus strengthening the local economy.

Links: 
[L1] https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/so-04-2013-0005/full/html 
[L2] https://www.ressourcenwende.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Circular-Economy-2021.pdf 
[L3] https://youtu.be/elPRPR_oLmQ?si=W7Js0picVlWpfrcz 

References: 
[1] I. Ivkić, et al., “Towards a Cost-Benefit Analysis of Additive Manufacturing as a Service”, in Proc. of the 14th Int. Conf. on Cloud Computing and Services Science - CLOSER; ISBN 978-989-758-701-6; ISSN 2184-5042, SciTePress, pages 338-345. DOI: 10.5220/0012733500003711
[2] E. Westkämper, C. Löffler, “Strategien der Produktion: Technologien, Konzepte und Wege in die Praxis”, Springer Vieweg, 2016.
[3] S. Chopra, P. Meindl, “Supply chain management”, Strategy, planning & operation (pp. 265-275), Gabler, 2007.

Please contact: 
Igor Ivkić 
Univerisity of Applied. Sciences Burgenland, AT and Lancaster University, UK 
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Burkhard List
b&mi GmbH & Co KG
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