From giant of computer technology to manufacturing company 4.0: Elmec 3D is born

After becoming a leading company for data and IT service management, which are essentially immaterial, Elmec adds a new piece of business and enters into the manufacturing industry.

A 4.0 manufacturing company, ideally much closer to the digital world but which, in fact, will produce real and tangible products: the new section Elmec 3D, a business unit dedicated to 3D printing, was inaugurated in Brunello, just a few steps from the main office equipped with a 300 square meter laboratory and cutting-edge machines for the prototyping and production of 3D objects.

At the helm of this new entrepreneurial adventure, which Elmec has developed hand in hand with the technological partner Hp, will be Martina Ballerio, 28, graduated in Materials Engineering at the Milan Polytechnic and specialized in Nanotechnologies through a master’s degree at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and the Université Joseph Fourier of Grenoble.

She will coordinate a team of about 20 people who will collaborate with universities and research institutes with the aim of innovating the manufacturing sector in Italy.

“According to IDC forecasts, world spending in 3D printing in 2018 will grow by 20% to reach about 12 billion dollars and will almost double in the next few years, a sign of growing demand for both prototyping and production in various sectors, with manufacturing and healthcare in the front line,” explained Rinaldo Ballerio, President of Elmec, during the inauguration. “For this reason, Elmec informatica has invested about 3 million euros in additive manufacturing with the creation of a cutting-edge laboratory in 3D printing of both plastic materials and, soon, metals. The manufacturing system and the innovation’s field of our country will have an extra place in Italy, a few kilometers from Milan, for rapid prototyping and production of  projects “.

“Elmec 3D provides customers with a team of specialists able to offer two types of support,” said, Martina Ballerio, head of Elmec 3D, “provide advice and training to companies to understand what technologies to take to make use of 3D printing for productive purposes; design, produce or redesign the components that customers want to print “.

 

The Elmec 3D laboratory will be equipped with 9 printers, including the HP Jet Fusion 3D 4200 and Jet Fusion 300/500, designed for the creation of functional parts and other models of printers that use additive manufacturing technologies such as SLA, FDM, SLS.

 

In the laboratory there will be sections dedicated to the design, construction and post-production phases of the pieces.

Among the very first case histories of the new business unit there is also a sport record: the creation of the ergonomic trolley for Sara Bertolasi, the Olympic rower.

Elmec 3D created a trolley  built ad hoc following the postural peculiarities of the athlete. In the design phase, the geometry of the trolley was adapted to the physical characteristics of Sara and the first prototype created was modified following a test. The final version was mounted on board her boat, to reduce the pain caused by long hours of training.