Cold Spray 3D Printing OEM SPEE3D Opens First US-Based Facility in New Hampshire

Cold spray additive manufacturing (CSAM) original equipment manufacturer (OEM) SPEE3D, based in Melbourne, Australia, has opened its first facility in the US, at the University of New Hampshire’s (UNH’s) John Olson Advanced Manufacturing Center. SPEE3D will manufacture printers at the Durham, NH site, while also using the facility as an applications testing center, enabling the company to work more closely with US-based customers.

Above all, the NH location gives SPEE3D easier access to customers involved in the company’s extensive work with the Department of Defense (DoD), especially the US Navy. New England is a key hub for the US naval industrial base, home to DoD sites like the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, as well as headquarters to contractors such as General Dynamics Electric Boat (GDEB), the US Navy’s primary submarines builder.

SPEE3D got major attention throughout 2023 for its DoD work, including supplying printers to the front lines in Ukraine. The company has made two significant product releases in Q2 2024: the end-to-end Expeditionary Manufacturing Unit (EMU), as well as the large-format TitanSPEE3D.

In a press release about SPEE3D’s establishment of its first US facility, the company’s CEO, Byron Kennedy, said, “Establishing our first US-based location at the Olson Center brings together a world-class manufacturing center at UNH with SPEE3D’s leading [CSAM] technology to a region known for its innovation and advancements. Although we are an Australian company, we have partners worldwide and a strong presence in America, so it made perfect sense to expand our footprint to address the needs of our partners.”

Marian McCord, UNH’s senior vice provost for Research, Economic Engagement and Outreach, said, “UNH’s partnership with SPEE3D underscores the vital role that academic and industry collaboration can play in fostering innovation and cutting-edge research. We are proud to be an integral part of the state’s innovation ecosystem by providing facilities, a skilled workforce, and access to a robust business and research community. We are thrilled SPEE3D has chosen UNH’s John Olson Advanced Manufacturing Center as its first US manufacturing location and look forward to establishing NH, and UNH, as a global destination for industry.”

If there’s one company that didn’t have an official foothold in US territory that should have, it’s SPEE3D, so this decision is about as much of a no-brainer as it gets. It is even better that SPEE3D is planning to manufacture printers in the US, burnishing the company’s credentials as a supporter of, and catalyst for, Western reshoring efforts.

Moreover, this further reinforces SPEE3D’s strengths along the lines of something I mentioned in a post about another of the company’s recent announcements, its collaboration with the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT). By focusing on cultivating its relationships with research institutions, SPEE3D is putting its products directly in the hands of the next generation of the US manufacturing workforce.

Alongside increasing its familiarity with future US manufacturing workers, SPEE3D’s presence in academia should also, in the long run, unlock the potential for CSAM applications in areas of industry outside defense. Thus, the company already seems to keeping an eye on branching out into other areas, at the same time as it’s ramping up its focus on the military.

Images courtesy of SPEE3D