Correspondence: n.cortinovis@uu.nl

Summary of the Session’s Theme and Objectives

Advanced manufacturing refers to companies adopting digital technologies and processes to enhance innovation, production and productivity. Within this sector, 3D Printing (3DP), also called Additive Manufacturing (AM), is reshaping production processes of firms. Popularly imagined as the technology “to produce almost anything from anywhere”, 3DP has been described as potentially having a transformative impact on production and innovation processes and their spatial footprint (D’Aveni, 2018). Conceptually, 3DP has been related to flexible and decentralized manufacturing (Laplume et al., 2016), changes in firm productivity and capabilities required for production (Leal et al., 2017) and providing more environmentally friendly processes as well as greater design freedom and faster innovation (Marak et al., 2019). Recently, empirical studies have investigated both the adoption and the impacts of 3DP (Freund et al., 2022) and indicated an increase in both its industrial applications and in patenting activity (Cavallo et al., 2023).

Building on these, some recent contributions in economic geography and innovation studies have emerged (Hahn & Massini, 2024; Wang et al., 2020), making the geographical dimensions of 3D printing an highly relevant area of inquiry for GEOINNO scholars. Specifically, as 3DP technology reshapes manufacturing and innovation landscapes, its uptake is likely to vary across regions, shaping new opportunities while deepening existing divides. For example, Corradini et al. (2021) argued that, compared to other industry 4.0 technologies, 3DP is highly localized due to their common use in high-tech manufacturing industries. However, as 3DP is a versatile technology, its use could expand beyond the manufacturing sector (Sanchez-Barrioluengo et al., 2025) and both the adoption and impact of 3D printing may be highly heterogeneous, potentially reinforcing geographical differences in infrastructure, skills and innovation ecosystems.

With this special session, we want to bring together scholars in the GEOINNO community working on 3DP and related advanced manufacturing technologies. Combining a focus on this specific technology while gathering contributions on a variety of topics (e.g. global value chains, 3DP adoption, industry-specific and/or context-specific case studies), we aim to comprehensively explore the spatial innovation and economic implications of 3DP as an emerging and under-studied technology. Contributions that are not specifically focused on advanced manufacturing but consider the geography of other enabling technologies would be of interest to this special session as well.

List of Topics to Be Presented in the Special Session

• Geographical drivers and bottlenecks in the adoption of advanced manufacturing technologies across the innovation process
• Advanced and additive manufacturing and local innovation dynamics
• Advanced and additive manufacturing and changes in the geography of production
• Skills, labor market outcomes and dynamics (e.g. entrepreneurship) associated to the adoption and use of advanced technologies
• Advanced and additive manufacturing in the green transition
• 3DP innovation ecosystems
• Regional and national policies for advanced manufacturing and the role of institutions
• Industry-specific and/or context-specific case studies on the adoption and impact of 3DP and advanced manufacturing
• Data and indicators for capturing 3DP and other enabling technologies adoption

Key References

Cavallo, F., Ceulemans, J., Gasner, B., Godino Martinez, M., Grilli, M., & Ménière, Y. (2023). Innovation trends in additive manufacturing. EPO Report.

Corradini, C., Santini, E., & Vecciolini, C. (2021). The geography of Industry 4.0 technologies across European regions. Regional Studies, 55(10–11), 1667–1680. https://doi.org/10.1080/00343404.2021.1884216

D’Aveni, R. A. (2018). The pan-industrial revolution: How new manufacturing titans will transform the world. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Freund, C., Mulabdic, A., & Ruta, M. (2022). Is 3D printing a threat to global trade? The trade effects you didn’t hear about. Journal of International Economics, 138, 103646. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jinteco.2022.103646

Hahn, E. D., & Massini, S. (2024). Cross-border and domestic early-stage financial investment in 3D printing: An empirical perspective on drivers and locations. Journal of International Management, 30(5), 101172. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intman.2024.101172

Laplume, A. O., Petersen, B., & Pearce, J. M. (2016). Global value chains from a 3D printing perspective. Journal of International Business Studies, 47(5), 595–609. https://doi.org/10.1057/jibs.2015.47

Leal, R., Barreiros, F. M., Alves, L., Romeiro, F., Vasco, J. C., Santos, M., & Marto, C. (2017). Additive manufacturing tooling for the automotive industry. The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology, 92(5), 1671–1676. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00170-017-0239-8

Marak, Z. R., Tiwari, A., & Tiwari, S. (2019). Adoption of 3D printing technology: An Innovation Diffusion Theory perspective. International Journal of Innovation, 7(1), Article 1. https://doi.org/10.5585/iji.v7i1.393

Sanchez-Barrioluengo, M.; Massini, S.; Zhan, P., Zhang, W. and Omar, A. (2025) Additive Manufacting in Greater Manchester. Deparment for Science, Innovation and Technology report. Forthcoming

Wang, L., Jiang, S., & Zhang, S. (2020). Mapping technological trajectories and exploring knowledge sources: A case study of 3D printing technologies. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 161, 120251. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2020.120251