On-demand manufacturing platform Fictiv has launched its Enterprise Business Solutions portfolio aimed at solving many of the supply chain challenges facing manufacturers.
Accessible through the firm’s base Enterprise platform, the portfolio contains three digital products designed to improve the efficiency, speed, and quality of product development and maintenance, repair and operations (MRO) processes for manufacturers.
“At all levels, business leaders are telling us they need fast, agile solutions to fix underperforming, sluggish supply chains,” said Bryan Painter, Global Vice President of Fictiv’s Enterprise Business Group.
“Digital manufacturing is no longer just about rapid prototyping and parts on-demand. It’s about driving real business transformation and changing the way we build products.”
Streamlining manufacturing
Fictiv was founded in 2013 with the aim of helping people build physical objects faster. The firm’s platform combines artificial intelligence (AI) with a range of manufacturing methods, including 3D printing, in order to streamline the production processes of its customers.
Since its launch, the firm has been ambitious with its technology and as a result has expanded its operations into China with the goal of creating a “new world order” with its software platform to democratize rapid, high-quality manufacturing. Off the back of this, the company raised $33 million in 2019 to automate the manufacturing workflow and a further $35 million last year to “aggressively expand” its software platform.
The company has received backing from some notable investors, including the likes of multinational conglomerate Honeywell and Microsoft’s Bill Gates, and has produced more than 18 million parts for companies active in the robotics, aerospace, automotive, and medical device sectors.
The partnership with Honeywell is a significant one for Fictiv, with Honeywell’s aerospace division seeing its engineering cycle times halved thanks to the firm’s rapid quotation software and quick turnaround of parts.
The new Enterprise Business Solutions portfolio
The new software tools offered by Fictiv can be accessed through its Enterprise platform, which is designed primarily to help manufacturers rationalize and digitally transform their tier two and three parts supply chains. The platform seeks to aid companies in achieving faster time-to-market, enhanced engineering productivity, improved parts supplier performance, and reduced supply chain management costs within their workflows.
The Enterprise platform already offers a number of useful tools for manufacturers, including preferred partner pricing, professional services for enhanced manufacturing guidance and program management, and analytics and reporting. The platform also provides enhanced intellectual property (IP) protection for companies through Secure+, which is reportedly the industry’s only SOC 2-certified digital manufacturing platform.
The new software tools are included under Fictiv’s Enterprise Business Solutions portfolio and cover three key areas. The first offering is NPD (new product development) Acceleration, which is designed to support a company’s engineering teams from early-stage prototypes to production-grade test parts. According to Fictiv, the tool will help companies to shorten their development cycles, unlock engineering productivity, and launch new products up to 70 percent faster while still maintaining part quality.
The second tool is ETO (engineer to order) Rapid Production, which aims to help companies place custom-engineered products in the hands of their customers quicker. Lastly, the third offering is MRO Digital Inventory, which is designed to enable manufacturing teams to rapidly build and replace production-line tools with a cost-effective MRO strategy.
“The chief supply chain officer will digitize on a number of fronts this year to achieve better visibility and insights on three key fronts,” technology analyst and business new commentator R “Ray” Wang told Fictiv.
“1) risk mitigation, 2) supplier rationalization and 3) gain leverage in new areas. Specifically, the areas of investment we are seeing are capturing demand signals through AI for better forecasting predictability, analytics for testing models, and various conditions, and tapping into new digitally-enabled supplier eco-systems, to gain deeper insights and ultimately gain leverage of NPD, ETO, and MRO suppliers – where traditionally the focus has been on economies of scale with mass production suppliers.”
Fictiv’s new Enterprise Business Solutions portfolio is now available to customers through its Enterprise platform.
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Featured image shows a prosthetic made for Lim Innovations with urethene casting method. Image via Fictiv.
