Our Innovation Analysts recently looked into emerging technologies and up-and-coming startups working on solutions for the manufacturing sector. As there is a large number of startups working on a wide variety of solutions, we decided to share our insights with you. This time, we are taking a look at 5 promising mass customization solutions.
Heat Map: 5 Top Mass Customization Solutions
Using our StartUs Insights Platform, covering 1.116.000+ startups & emerging companies, we looked at innovation in the field of manufacturing. For this research, we identified 150 relevant solutions and picked 5 to showcase below. These companies were chosen based on a data-driven startup scouting approach, taking into account factors such as location, founding year, and technology among others. Depending on your specific criteria, the top picks might look entirely different.
The Global Startup Heat Map below highlights 5 startups & emerging companies developing mass customization solutions. Moreover, the Heat Map reveals regions that observe a high startup activity and illustrates the geographic distribution of all 150 companies we analyzed for this specific topic.
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OmniRobotic – Robotics For Industrial Paint & Powder Coatings
Traditionally, leveraging economies of scale allow industries, such as automotive and electronics to flourish, as they already possess mass production capabilities. With further advancements in robotics and automation, 3D printing, and artificial intelligence (AI), startups are developing solutions to enable organizations to drive profitability with mass customization.
Canadian startup OmniRobotic offers AI-based robotic solutions for production-line painting and powder coating for various parts. The startup’s proprietary Shape-to-Motion technology tracks the continuously moving production line and identifies parts based on shape. This real-time identification allows for uniformity in paint and powder coating in all products, especially for industries that have large assemblies and heavy equipment. The startup allows for minimizing errors and rework while optimizing production processes.
Form Found Design – Self-Supporting Cladding System
The conventional method of casting concrete involves significant labor, time, and operational hurdles. All this eventually leads to project delays and increases in cost. Additive manufacturing allows users to cast concrete into any shape and size with the help of computer-aided 3D printing designs. While this technology is applicable in many industries, its applications in construction include building facade elements and primary structures. In combination with additive manufacturing, rapid prototyping also allows construction companies to efficiently implement mass customization.
The US-based startup Form Found Design enables the mass customization of fabric form-cast concrete structures. The startup’s Form Found Facade is a building facade system that creates shading through variable size apertures and is also self-supporting. With the help of a six-axis 3D printer, computer-aided design (CAD), and computer numerical control (CNC) milling, the startup fabricates uniquely customized parts. This method is faster compared to traditional concrete casting while also retaining the cost benefits of mass manufacturing.
Nimbly – Mass Textile Customization Solutions
High design flexibility, rapid turnaround times, and optimal inventory levels are some benefits of mass textile customization. Online retail stores and small businesses increasingly seek manufacturing capacities, across different geographies, in order to find the most suitable partner for production. Startups develop connected mass customization solutions for textile manufacturers and enable organizations to maximize their revenues by utilizing global capacities.
Nimbly, a US-based startup, is building the tech platform Nimbly Made that connects knitting machines across the globe for textile customization. This platform enables the startup to analyze the global capacities of various factories in the network. The platform shares an encrypted knit file to the appropriate machine and also tracks the secondary inventory such as tags, labels, yarn, and buttons. This solution helps small businesses implement mass customization by optimizing their orders based on design or volumes, in real-time.
Fast Radius – Mass Personalization & Serialization
From apparel, food, and consumer electronics to healthcare and automotive, industries require efficient solutions for mass customizing their products. The growth of social media platforms enables organizations to allow their consumers to virtually create their own designs. Emerging companies are working to develop solutions for integrating mass manufacturing with small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
The US-based startup Fast Radius provides additive manufacturing solutions to manufacture bespoke products. The startup enables mass personalization with options for printing names, textures, and custom-fit components. This process also includes serialization, such as custom data matrix codes, for each product. Fast Radius provides its customers with production-grade manufacturing and global fulfillment services in addition to product design and testing.
MilleBot – Intermodal Machine Platform
Flexible production systems offer key benefits for making small batch production more profitable. The speed of changes in configuration directly impacts the lead time for manufacturing companies. Adaptive configuration software, in combination with 3D printing, paves the way for hybrid manufacturing – additive and subtractive. This enables startups to develop turnkey solutions that are mobile and highly configurable with mass customization.
The US-American startup MilleBot develops a turnkey intermodal machining platform for digital manufacturing applications. With the help of a three-axis and five-axis CNC and laser, the startup enables hybrid manufacturing applications. This high-volume machining platform is available in three sizes and is suitable for implementation in numerous locations, regardless of existing infrastructure. Moreover, the startup offers its system upgrades off-the-shelf.
What About The Other 145 Solutions?
While we believe data is key to creating insights it can be easy to be overwhelmed by it. Our ambition is to create a comprehensive overview and provide actionable innovation intelligence so you can achieve your goals faster. The 5 mass customization solutions showcased above are promising examples out of 150 we analyzed for this article. To identify the most relevant solutions based on your specific criteria, get in touch.
