Titomic and Fincantieri join forces to manufacture parts for shipbuilding industry

Less than a week after securing a partnership with the world’s largest golf club manufacturer, Titomic (ASX: TTT) announced it will work with Italian shipbuilder’s Australian division Fincantieri Australia to incorporate Titomic’s kinetic fusion technology with Fincantieri’s manufacturing activities.

The duo inked a memorandum of understanding that paves the way for the companies to collaborate for the next 12 months on using Titomic’s proprietary process to enhance manufacturing efficiencies at Fincantieri.

At last year’s Pacific 2017 International Maritime Exposition, Titomic collared the Best Maritime Innovation award, which anchored its entry into the sector.

“This agreement with Fincantieri marks a significant milestone for future shipbuilding and industrial scale additive manufacturing,” Titomic chief executive officer Jeff Lang said.

“Titomic’s signing with Fincantieri to evaluate our Titomic kinetic fusion process will not only add value to existing manufacturing and repair activities, it will lead to he creation of next generation high tech vessels,” Mr Lang added.

According to Titomic, Fincantieri is one of the world’s most “diversified and successful” shipbuilders, with 20 yards across four continents.

“This significance of this partnership examines how we can introduce new manufacturing technologies to make Australia sovereign in advanced naval technology and improve our solutions on the worldwide market,” Fincantieri Australia chairman Dario Deste said.

Titomic’s kinetic fusion

Titomic’s kinetic fusion is its proprietary method for spraying titanium and titanium alloy particles onto a frame. The sprayed particles coat or form the basis of a product and afford it the benefits of titanium (or other metals).

As one of the world’s highest performing metals, titanium is light-weight and offers exceptional corrosion resistance. Because of these properties, it is used in medical and aerospace sectors.

However, due to the prohibitive cost of the traditionally creating the metal, it’s uptake in “every day” products has been limited.

Titanium’s kinetic fusion process offers an alternative avenue for incorporating the metal into every day products including bicycles and golf clubs.

Under its kinetic fusion process, Titomic bombards its titanium sold phase material at supersonic speed. When the titanium reaches critical speed, the titanium particles undergo plastic deformation and create the coating or structure.

The process allows dissimilar metals to be joined and incorporated in a structure. It also allows stronger structures to be created without welding, folding or bending, resulting in reduced time to market.

Later this week, Titomic will be launching the world’s largest 3D printer at its Melbourne facility.

The market reacted positively to Titomic’s news with the company one of the day’s biggest gaining stocks on the ASX. By mid-afternoon trade, the share price was up 19.4% to A$2.83.