Advances in 3D printing technology could revolutionise the way we produce goods and repatriate manufacturing jobs to the UK. Additive manufacturing, as the process is technically known, works by building up solid objects layer by wafer-thin layer, in much the same way as a conventional 2D inkjet printer. The object is scanned, or designed on computer modelling software, then sliced up, like a loaf of bread, into thousands of tiny layers, which can then be printed out to form a solid three-dimensional product. If the last industrial revolution brought us mass production and the advent of economies of scale - the digital revolution could bring manufacturing back full circle - to an era of mass personalisation, and a return to individual craft. Dr Phil Reeves, managing director of Econolyst, an additive manufacturing consultancy, explained: "The ability to mass-personalise products and produce individual products for individual consumers opens up an enormous opportunity, it almost takes us back to a craft industry where things were made for individuals. "And then we moved into the domain of mass production and everything was the same - now we're using digital tools but to make individual products. "At the moment we're 3D printing hearing aids, hip implants, we're starting to see consumer goods and personal products - toys - being personalised to the individual consumer, and that in itself has benefits to the environment because people are keeping the product for longer, and it has more value to the consumer."
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