The purpose of this thesis is to present the current needs and practices of additive manufacturing in the Finnish industry. To obtain the necessary information, a survey of eight companies was carried out. An introduction to additive manufacturing and its applications is given to give the reader a better understanding of the survey.A survey was designed and the process explained. The main tool, the questionnaire, was chosen to be the best option to conduct the survey and was designed to consist of a combination of open questions and scale questions. The questionnaire was presented to eight companies of varying size in the research and development industry. Fifteen people from these companies were chosen for the survey.All of the qualitative answers were analytically quantified and expanded upon. The findings of the survey were compared to the findings of other worldwide reports.The results obtained through this study include data regarding familiarity of AM technologies, ownership of machinery, outsourcing practices, and general perception of AM in Finnish companies.It was found that while the Finnish industry is somewhat lagging behind on some fronts of AM usage, the trend is showing that AM is becoming more widely understood and its usage in more advanced applications is on the rise.
展开▼