Ricerc@Sapienza

Several are nowadays the technologies considered determinant enablers of relevant
changes in societies and economies. One of these is Additive Manufacturing.
Additive Manufacturing has been widely hailed as a revolution, hyped by the
covers of publications from Wired, The Economist, Harvard Business Review and
other important magazines. It has been defined as “a historic window of opportunity
to rewrite the rules of industry”.1 An outstanding opportunity to reconfigure the production
and business models without exploiting the already depleted earth resources.
But how can Additive Manufacturing enable more sustainable models of production
and consumption?
It is undeniable that AM provides a clear insight into impressive potentials and
its usage on production is slowly showing a remarkable leap forward. Several are
the sectors, industrial and non-industrial, that are slowly approaching the new technologies
encompassed by Additive Manufacturing. In this paper We will therefore
describe the unquestionable benefits gained through the adoption of the different
AM technologies. Advantages such as material saving, design flexibility, possibility
to create complex geometries, the high level of personalization and precision gained
are the factors that are pushing these technologies to a tipping point.