Nikon Advanced Manufacturing & America Makes to Develop Aluminum Powder Dataset

Nikon Advanced Manufacturing Inc., the Long Beach-based end-to-end metal additive manufacturing (AM) firm, has announced that the company is partnering with the Manufacturing USA Institute America Makes to develop an AM aluminum alloy dataset. Nikon AM, along with partners including metal powders supplier Constellium, standards organization ASTM International, AM consulting firm 3Degrees, and a group of the US’s largest defense primes, has been awarded a $2.1 million contract to complete the first two phases of this multi-phase project.

The project will leverage powder bed fusion (PBF) printers made by Nikon SLM Solutions to validate Constellium’s Aheadd CP1 powder (Aluminum-Zirconium-Iron), with the aim of accelerating the material’s qualification for aerospace and defense applications. Aluminum is perhaps one of the most widely used metals across the defense industry, and in December 2024, a critical metals list published by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) suggested that aluminum had the highest supply risk amongst twelve metals considered vital to defense applications.

According to Nikon AM, defense primes have forecast that the resulting return on investment (ROI) from combining Nikon SLM printers and Constellium’s Aheadd CP1 powder will be an improvement over current process/material combinations. Once the processes are validated, the US Department of Defense (DoD) will make the dataset available to qualified defense and aerospace manufacturers.

In a press release announcing the partnership, Nikon AM CEO Hamid Zarringhalam said, “We are committed to accelerating and scaling metal [AM] for defense and aerospace applications. Manufacturers recognize AM’s tremendous potential to address gaps in the defense industrial base, particularly through high-performance materials and advanced technologies like Nikon SLM Solutions’ large-format NXG XII 600 Series [PBF] systems.”

Nikon AM’s VP of Technology, Dr. Behrang Poorganji, added, “This project focuses on basic and intermediate-level property characterization, and we will form a collaborative Government Advisory Team with the Joint Additive Manufacturing Working Group (JAMWG) to support program direction-setting, review, and go/no-go decisions, as well as to guide the Material Property Dataset transfer into the Workbench for Additive Materials (WAM) database.”

As Zarringhalam explained to me in an interview last fall, aerospace and defense have long been crucial to Nikon AM’s long-term plans. Among other developments, this was evidenced by the company’s appointment of former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, to its board last summer.

This latest pivotal step in that direction comes at a time when the aluminum tariff has returned to 25 percent, a level last seen during the first Trump administration, and as US demand for the metal remains high. With the aerospace and defense markets likely to be among the hardest hit by increased costs and potential supply constraints, aluminum powder could be an indispensable insurance policy against these substantial risks.

It is especially noteworthy that Nikon AM will be forming a Government Advisory Team to liaise with the JAMWG, as that would seem to indicate that this project is the beginning of a long-range effort that will play a significant role in Nikon AM’s overall business strategy for years to come. Going forward, it will be worth observing whether this initial project evolves and leads to Nikon AM’s validation of other critical materials for the defense industrial base.