Dream Big in 3Dimensions: Materialise China Hosts Focus Day
Kim Francois, Managing Director of Materialise China, signs the event poster
Last week, it was time for the third edition of Materialise China’s Focus Day! This year’s edition was called “Dream Big in 3Dimensions”; a two-day event uniting high-end speakers from different industries, and over 200 visitors who ranged from customers and partners to industrial players interested in the possibilities of Additive Manufacturing. Read on to get a taste of how the event went.
Focus Day was initially started with the intention of (the name gives it away) focusing on one specific topic, and providing our customers and partners with a better insight of the possibilities of that particular aspect of AM. The two previous editions covered OEM solutions and Design for AM – and this year, the services and solutions around our software were put in the limelight, such as co-creation and software or medical workshops.
There was plenty going on during the two days of the event! After some opening speeches from the local government and the Belgian consul, the General Manager of Materialise China and our Executive Vice President, Bart van der Schueren, gave two keynote speeches. The Secretary-General of the Shanghai Additive Manufacturing Association also helped start the day, followed by keynotes from Hoya, about our collaboration with them on the Yuniku project, and Siemens PLM.
Then followed the Materials track for our industrial visitors, the Medical track for visitors from the
healthcare industry, and a New Business Model track with presentations from Sonova about the hearing aid industry, DSM Somos and Honeywell about 3D Printing in aerospace.
Visitors also got plenty of opportunities for some hands-on experience: from a Design for AM course to a workshop covering the newest functionality of Materialise Mimics (Scripting, or the ability to automate your workflow), these sessions were very well received and attended. We also provided a workshop on Safety and Quality Training which explored how to fit 3D printing technology in highly regulated industries, as well as a panel discussion on IP Management which covered the legal intricacies of Additive Manufacturing.
On the evening of the 18th of October, we were also incredibly proud to present attendees with our brand-new Dream Space, also located in Shanghai near our Chinese office. Our colleagues in China sensed the lack of a proper environment in which to work together with customers. So to tell our story more immersively, they developed the Dream Space, which will allow them to host workshops, local consultancy, co-creation sessions and so on. The space was officially inaugurated with a reception and some bubbles. Cheers!
"This event effectively fulfilled its objective of communicating knowledge about new 3D printing technologies that help explore possibilities in different application domains,"
– said Mr. Fanghei Tsau, General Director of the Laser and Additive Manufacturing Technology Center in Taiwan.
We host several workshops and events throughout the year. Keep an eye out on what’s next on our events page.