ADDMAN Buys Forecast 3D — Market Impact Analysis

ADDMAN has purchased Forecast 3D. Private equity-backed ADDMAN has previously bought Keselowski Advanced Manufacturing, Castheon, Dinsmore, and others to become a major player in metal and polymer additive manufacturing. We have podcasts featuring CEO Joseph Calmese and Jay Dinsmore to give you more insight into the company. So far, it looks like ADDMAN is ambitious, growth-oriented, and very intro assembling the entire manufacturing toolkit while developing high-end defense-facing capabilities. From refractories to SLA and injection molding, and even CNC, the company wants to be a — so far only US-based — manufacturing powerhouse that can take on most any task.

Forecast 3D itself was a leading independent polymer service bureau that pioneered MJF and footwear 3D printing before its sale to GKN. Automotive and aerospace supplier GKN then integrated it into its GKN Additive unit. The rest of the unit uses DMLS and a metal binder jet to produce components such as cold plates, copper induction coils, and circuit breakers.

It seems like ADDMAN will maintain the Carlsbad, California-based Forecast 3D operation and brand, as well as the California-based Dinsmore facility and brand. Forecast 3D had over 60 machines and produced over one million parts annually. The company had 45 machines when it was acquired by GKN in 2019.

ADDMAN CEO Joe Calmese said,

“Our strategy has always been about scale and capability, We are building the largest additive manufacturing service provider in the market. Designed to support any part, any process, at any stage of the customer’s journey. Bringing Forecast 3D into ADDMAN makes that vision real today, and we will continue to raise the bar for what customers should expect from an advanced manufacturing partner.”

This is another win for ADDMAN owner American Industrial Partners, which is building one of the largest service offerings in the US. ADDMAN reports having over 160 industrial 3D printers currently. Calmese continues, saying,

“Reaching this scale matters, but it isn’t the finish line. Our focus is how we use it; where we invest next, how we partner, and how we continue expanding what AM can do. That’s the journey we’re on at ADDMAN.”

Forecast 3D was acquired by GKN Powdered Metallurgy in 2019; ADDMAN only got started a year later. The company has been on a mad race for scale since then. GKN, meanwhile, is on a bit of a retrench. Melrose Industries, a UK-based roll-up and restructuring firm, acquired GKN in 2018 and later spun off the Powdered Metallurgy business in 2023. Melrose itself was on a madcap run to develop and restructure much of Britain’s high-tech industry before biting off more than it could chew with GKN. The fallout has covered some former subsidiaries with soot. American Axle & Manufacturing (AAM), which sounds like a fake company in a Bugs Bunny cartoon but is actually a $6 billion revenue automotive components manufacturer, bought 51% of GKN Automotive and GKN Powdered Metallurgy a year ago for $1.44 billion. Dowlais, the original demerged combination of Automotive and Powdered Metallurgy, will retain a 49% stake. This semi-uncomfortable straddle is strange enough, of course, but owning a polymer company on the side was perhaps a bit of a stretch for the corporates involved.

The driveshaft business is under assault as well, from Chinese manufacturing on the one hand and electric vehicles (EVs) on the other hand. Even though Dowlais was a 4.9 billion pound business, the purchase price for half of it was less than half the revenue. Its revenues and operating profit declined, and it recorded a 109 million pound loss in 2024. GKN Automotive also has just 15% of its revenues coming from China, while the Powdered Metallurgy side gets 13% of its revenue from China. Both segments generate around 40% of their revenue from the US, while operating margins were 6.8% and 9.1%. And this was before the recent flood of Chinese EV’s hit Europe.

This is especially troubling now, given the lack of competitiveness globally for US car brands and the uncertainties around US car manufacturing. While the market may grow slightly locally, new cars have become unaffordable for many, and much of the buying seems to flow from stock market gains. The radical split between the lack of purchasing power of the middle class and the huge asset gains made by the happy few is something that many firms in the US have yet to get their heads around. So the sales part of this deal seems more than logical for Dowlais and American Axle.

On the purchasing side, this is also more than logical. This gives ADDMAN more scale in polymer LPBF. Now the firm can tackle the largest print runs in the US. Bigger scale deters newer private equity firms from market entry and forestalls their growth. More scale can let the firm handle more government contracts and obtain a larger share of the overall spend on additive. ADDMAN typically lets its companies prosper by themselves, and American Industrial Partners also seems to leave companies to their own devices as long as they are disciplined. We were lucky enough to have a great session by ADDMAN and American Industrial Partners at Additive Manufacturing Strategies (AMS) last year, where they explained how they approach M&A and how focusing on customers drives their growth and acquisitions. Listening to COO Deven Suthar, CEO Joseph Calmese, and American Industrial Partners’ Danny Davis really gave us all insight into just how ambitious AIP and ADDMAN are and how they plan to win through scale, growth, and driving customer success. That really should resonate with the culture at Forecast 3D, which is very “can-do.” Through arming ADDMAN with more resources, this acquisition should help them in their quest to become the preeminent additive manufacturing service in the US.