The future all adds up

A modern baby diaper is a very sophisticated and complex construction of different materials.
It can consist of anything up to 20 separate nonwovens, films, tapes and SAP, all of which could be supplied by different companies and have their own transportation, storing and handling requirements.
These separate materials are then rolled, inserted, treated and added in separate sections of a diaper manufacturing machine that can be anything up to 40 metres long, and is as equally complex as the intended end-product.
It’s just the way things are. At the moment.

But is a Rolls Royce engine component which could not be made by any traditional machinery – involving cutting away separate parts in order to then join them together into the required product – any less complex than a baby diaper?

There is a phrase on the wind, and it’s ‘additive manufacturing’ - could  3D printing be poised to turn the way we make just about everything on its head?