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Understanding Metallurgic Additive Manufacturing in Defense

August 1, 2024

Case Study

Challenge

The Department of Defense (DoD) is looking to strengthen the security of its supply chains through the benefits of additive manufacturing. Knowing that the metal materials segment of the additive manufacturing market dominated 2023 market share for the industry, the agency sought to understand the benefits of metallurgic additive manufacturing on ordnance and defense and the accompanying risks.

Additive manufacturing affords the opportunity to establish resilience in a variety of supply chains around the world, but with this immense promise comes with a commensurate amount of targeting and risk exposure.

The additive manufacturing method emerged in the 1980s but has grown in feasibility and popularity in recent years due to its broad applicability across a variety of industries: The current global additive manufacturing market is valued at $17.99 billion and is expected to grow at 19.85% a year between 2024 and 2033. Furthermore, in May 2022, the Biden administration introduced the AM Forward Program, a policy to encourage large-scale manufacturers to promote the usage of additive manufacturing technology to its suppliers to encourage more domestic manufacturing.

Solution

To gain a complete picture of the metallurgic additive manufacturing impact to defense, the DoD trusted Exiger to illuminate, analyze, and visualize the pricing trends, supplier risk, and adversary capabilities within the market. The Exiger platform provided interactive dashboards that enabled DoD users to dive into the “nth-tier” of relationships for entities that supply or develop the technology, materials, or services involved. In addition, Exiger provided recommendations to address potential risk areas and how DoD can best capitalize on the benefits of the technology.

Impact

Exiger investigated and risk-assessed approximately 700 entities associated with additive manufacturing for defense and ordnance applications. While Exiger provided the DoD with insights on global trends and how they can further benefit from additive manufacturing capabilities, the illumination also uncovered sector-level vulnerabilities that the DoD can address proactively.

One trend identified is how the technology has allowed entities to re-evaluate shipping methods and increase supply chain resiliency through strategies such as reshoring. Exiger was also able to provide the DoD with data on the fluctuation of material pricing for additive manufacturing. With this insight and more, the DoD is able to build an informed strategy and resourcing plan.

Based on the information provided by Exiger, the DoD also gained an informed risk picture regarding the degree of cybersecurity risk among the entities operating within the sector, the relevant risk to personnel and systems, and where adversaries stand with use and control of this technology. Exiger also identified frequent obfuscation of corporate relationships in the sector, which creates potential vectors for stolen intellectual property and exposure of critical technology to adversaries. This analysis allows the DoD to build mitigation strategies into their operations and take immediate action to counteract the looming threats to prevent harm and better prepare for what the future battlespace will look like.

To learn more about how to gain visibility and insight into technologies that impact your supply chain and how to best leverage them, contact Exiger today.

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