BUSINESS & “INDUSTRY 4.0”
Direct digital manufacturing – the role of cost accounting for online hubs to access industry 4.0
Additive manufacturing is an established production method to realize Direct Digital Manufacturing in Industry 4.0. Especially for metal components, production requires high investment sums and high levels of know-how in the organisation. To make the advantages of the technology accessible even without high initial investment costs, co-called online hubs became an external and decentralised alternative to additive in-house production. After uploading the geometry to the online portals, material and post processing can be selected. The hub gives the customer a direct pricing response which is one of the main economic indicators for a purchase decision. The present paper focuses on the influence of the order quantity and the complexity of the components on the price algorithm. Therefore, sample parts of varying complexity and sizes are developed and uploaded to analyse data. Based on the in-depth findings of the study, the results are discussed.