As Additive Manufacturing and the digitalization of processes continue to grow, they pose new challenges for the manufacturing industry in terms of data protection and protection of intellectual property as well as confirmability and traceability. The industry needs a decentralized solution that can ensure data sovereignty and traceability of data usage. This applies even more since manufacturing is becoming more and more decentralized, as it is conducted within global networks and parts are produced where they are needed.

thyssenkrupp and IBM have developed a prototype that builds the foundation for further expansion of an industrial manufacturing platform. The combined use of IDS (International Data Space) technology and Blockchain is intended to enable a higher degree of automation within the Additive Manufacturing process, as well as to provide data security and data sovereignty. On the one hand, this will enable smaller customers without previous expertise to access Additive Manufacturing services quickly and easily, and on the other hand, the platform will enable better planning and a verifiable quality standard across the entire process chain.

Christian Schultze-Wolters is Director of Blockchain Solutions DACH with IBM. He brings more than 25 years of sales experience in IBM, leading different sales teams in a national and international environment. After his responsibility for the Travel & Transportation industry in Germany he took over the lead for IBMs Blockchain business in Germany, Austria & Switzerland in late summer 2018 driving solutions and individual projects across all industries.

IBM is recognized as the leading enterprise blockchain provider. IBM is the leader in open-source blockchain solutions built for the enterprise. Since 2016, IBM has worked with hundreds of clients across financial services, supply chain, government, retail, digital rights management and healthcare to implement blockchain applications, and operates a number of networks running live and in production. IBM is an early member of Hyperledger, an open source collaborative effort created to advance cross-industry blockchain technologies. For more information about IBM Blockchain, visit https://www.ibm.com/blockchain/ or follow us on Twitter at @ibmblockchain.