Markforged
Reaching for the limits of rapid prototyping with industrial 3D printing
Markforged is a global leader in advanced additive manufacturing, shaping a new era of rapid, high-strength component production. Our partnership began when we helped design the FX10 platform, a groundbreaking leap in industrial 3D printing, created to bring industrial parts to the point of need.
Now, in this latest chapter of our journey together, we’re using the FX10 at our Global Innovation and Technology Centre (GITC) in Cambridge, UK – accelerating design cycles, deepening our engineering capability, and reinforcing Markforged in real-world environments to demonstrate the power of their technology. The result is a collaboration built on mutual benefit, shared invention, and tangible impact for consumers.
Setting the foundation for a next-generation partnership
Our relationship with Markforged began with our industrial design team in Boston helping bring one of their flagship assets – the FX10 – to life. That partnership evolved when we recognised the potential of the new FX10 platform and approached Markforged’s team in Europe to explore how we could use the machine ourselves. Our ambition was twofold: accelerate prototyping for our multidisciplinary teams across sectors, and create a real-world demonstration site where Markforged could showcase the machine’s use cases to their European customers.
We were looking for a partner who didn’t just showcase technology, but pushed its boundaries, solving real engineering problems, and demonstrating possibilities customers may never have considered.”
Our GITC is the heart of our international network of creative studios, research labs, and engineering centres. It’s where we turn ingenious ideas into physical and digital reality. In this case, it acted as the ideal hub for design, engineering, and fabrication using the FX10. For Markforged, there was great value in placing their asset where it could live, work, and be tested daily on real PA assignments.
Understanding the bottlenecks slowing advanced engineering
Manufacturing teams everywhere face the same challenge: balancing speed, cost, and complexity while delivering high-performance parts. Many components – particularly aluminium-strength brackets, fixtures, and covers – require machining or external fabrication, adding delays and limiting iteration. For fast-paced prototyping, where every day matters, this slows down everything from design sprints to in-market product testing.
Our engineering teams needed a way to:
- Rapidly produce aluminium-strength parts without the overhead of machining
- Iterate multiple designs simultaneously
- Reduce reliance on third-party fabrication
- Increase flexibility for complex geometries
- Free up expert machinists to focus on high-complexity craftsmanship.
We can produce immensely strong parts that we’d normally have to machine or fabricate, and doing it in-house with the FX10 lets us move at breakneck speed.”
Unlocking new ways of working
We integrated the FX10 directly into our end-to-end development workflow. Designers, engineers, and scientists at our GITC can now move seamlessly from concept to CAD to printed part – in hours, not days, unlike other methods. Using Markforged’s Eiger software, our team can tune strength, speed, and material performance through a single interface, enabling us to choose exactly the right balance for each part.
Our engineers quickly discovered new efficiencies. As Josh Willmot, PA engineering expert, explained, “If you want one aluminium-strength bracket, we can now make it quickly. If you want 15 variations, that used to be a week of machining – now it’s an overnight print.”
Our team have found ways to maximise the FX10’s unique attributes across various sectors such as:
- Consumer and manufacturing: PulPac manufacturing line components can now move from prototype to fully operational use within a single day. We produce high-strength components for production line automation, transitioning seamlessly from concept parts to live environments. We also create detailed product samples for dynamic testing and design evaluation, enabling rapid iteration and accelerating overall development.
- Health and life sciences: Producing a wide range of high-accuracy fixtures to support the development, testing, and verification of complex medical devices.
- Defence and security: Printing functional test components ahead of commissioning hundreds of precision-machined parts. We also manufacture finished components where carbon fibre replaces steel, reducing weight while increasing strength.
For Markforged, the GITC now acts as a live demonstration centre. Their team brings prospective customers to see the machine operating in a real R&D environment – not a showroom – showing the scale, speed, and versatility of the technology; and our attempts to reach for its limits.
Walking our customers through a live production floor – where the FX10 is tackling high-stakes assignments in real-time – cuts through the noise of a demo room and shows them exactly what this machine is built for.”
Delivering measurable gains in speed, cost, and capability
The collaboration has reshaped how our teams work and the value they deliver:
- Faster iteration – Design teams iterate in hours, enabling ‘fail fast, fail cheap’ cycles that de-risk work.
- Reduced downtime – Engineers can print unattended, freeing time for higher-value work compared to the high-contact machining process on a CNC (Computer Numerical Control).
- Broader capability – We now produce complex geometries that would previously require specialist machinery.
- Cost avoidance – Proving concepts in-house prevents unnecessary external fabrication.
The impact is far-reaching. Consumers ultimately benefit from quicker product development including more robust functional prototypes, and faster delivery of finished-quality innovations to market.
We’re not just telling clients we innovate – we’re showing them the machines, the parts, and the teams that make it real. We’re showing them the FX10 in production to deliver parts and performance that simply weren’t possible until now.”
What we have at PA is more than a placement of the FX10 – it’s a living proof point of what the machine can actually do. Their team pushes the platform harder and faster than any demo environment could, and the results speak for themselves. Seeing the FX10 solve real engineering challenges in real time has become one of our most powerful tools for showing customers in person what’s possible.”
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