GE Additive selected by Honda Aircraft Engine R&D Center to provide consulting services to accelerate aerospace application development

GE Additive (NYSE: GE) today announced its first AddWorksTM additive consulting services engagement in Japan with Honda R&D Co., Ltd, Aircraft Engine R&D Center (Honda Aircraft Engine R&D Center). This agreement aims to further Honda Aircraft Engine R&D Group’s additive application development for its future generation aircraft engines.

GE Additive provides additive machines, materials and AddWorks engineering consultancy services to customers to help introduce and accelerate additive manufacturing into their businesses. AddWorks consultants help determine whether additive manufacturing will benefit the organization economically as well as from a performance perspective. The AddWorks team’s expertise is rooted in GE’s experience with additive manufacturing, which has helped produce additive parts for aerospace systems including CFM International’s LEAP aircraft engines and the GE Catalyst™ advanced turboprop engine.
GE and Honda’s partnership in the aviation industry spans over a decade. Having established GE Honda Aero Engines LLC – a joint venture between GE Aviation and Honda Aero in 2004 – the two companies developed the GE Honda HF120 jet engine used on light business jet aircrafts such as HondaJet. HondaJet was the most delivered jet in its category for 2017, making the engine a great success. GE Additive hopes the AddWorks consulting services will lead to enhancements of the existing partnership between the two companies and further the adoption of additive manufacturing in the aerospace industry.
“We are pleased that Honda Aircraft Engine R&D Center has selected GE Additive to be its vendor in providing AddWorks consulting services to further the use of this transformative technology in its future generation aircraft engines. We are in the best position to share our learnings from our own additive journey, having started from prototyping to successfully applying it to mass production for aviation engine parts,” said Thomas Pang, Japan director of GE Additive.

GE Additive established its operations in Japan this January and announced the availability of commercial offerings in June 2018 as part of its plans to be a $1 billion business by 2020 with a strategy to sell 10,000 machines by 2026. According to SmarTech Publishing, a leading industry analyst, more than US$280 billion will be invested in additive manufacturing over the next 10 years. GE Additive in Japan will sell Concept Laser and Arcam EBM additive machines as well as materials directly and via local resellers to Japan-based customers with a focus on key industries, including aerospace, automotive, heavy industry and others.