Thrinno announces new Thrinno MarketPlace® AM sourcing platform

AM software solutions provider Thrinno, Ghent, Belgium, has announced the launch of Thrinno MarketPlace®, an integrated manufacturing platform for metal Additive Manufacturing aimed at allowing companies to obtain the most competitive price globally, based on actual manufacturing capacity available. According to Thrinno, the platform will also offer professional design optimisation and allow users to check their current designs for free using Thrinno Metal AM Design Checks.

Thrinno previously released Thrinno Fast Quote, a quotation generator for metal AM service providers. However, when using this platform to compare manufacturing costs from potential suppliers, customers may receive entirely different prices from each source, Thrinno stated, making it difficult to determine standard market costs and value for money. Additionally, a single supplier’s quotes may fluctuate from month to month.

This is because multiple customer orders are printed together on the same build plate; the fuller the build plate, the more economical the production process and the lower the production cost will be. Thrinno MarketPlace® seeks to enable customers to find build plates at high capacity and schedule their order accordingly, resulting in the lowest price.

Thrinno claims that the new platform will in turn benefit suppliers by enabling them to “top-up” their build plates. Eventually, suppliers may also have the option to connect their system with the platform to get real-time information on pieces that fit onto their build plate.

Using Thrinno MarketPlace®, companies will be able to access a bidding system to attain the most competitive price from suppliers with excess short-term capacity in the near future, request assistance from AM consultants in assessing all functional aspects when designing a part for metal AM, assess their designs’ printability and gain a better understanding of the design process and other factors that influence printability.

Companies can also opt to be matched with the right supplier through a proprietary matching system and request a quotation from suppliers they feel confident doing business with, Thrinno reported. Suppliers can be filtered further based on geographic location, materials, experience, type of industry, printable dimensions and print lead times. Suppliers can also be asked to sign an e-NDA before accessing the file.