The RAPID + TCT Conference Program is where additive manufacturing moves from promise to practice.
A programme comprising nine tracks, 168 presentations and more than 200 experts has been designed for engineers, product leaders, manufacturers, and decision-makers.
Across four days, participants will be able to derive deep technical insight, consume real-world case studies, and absorb strategic perspectives that are immediately applicable to their roles, whether they work in automotive or energy, and whether they're scaling production or are only just getting started.
Ahead of RAPID + TCT, the TCT team has selected the conference sessions that they are most looking forward to.
Amanda Hull, RAPID + TCT Conference Manager & Specialist Project Manager
The OEM Collaboration: Navigating Quality & Regulation in Med Device Advanced Manufacturing | Laura Gilmore - LG Strategies
Per Laura, the knowledge gap among original equipment manufacturers regarding the regulatory frameworks for medical devices can impede product development timelines and regulatory submissions.
This session will seek to foster a mutual understanding and alignment between medical device manufacturers and OEMs so stakeholders can better leverage advanced manufacturing to accelerate innovation while maintaining regulatory compliance and product quality.
Learning objective: Participants will be able to describe strategies to align advanced manufacturing innovation with FDA quality system and documentation requirements to facilitate efficient regulatory review.
Who should attend: OEMs, AM service bureaus, and medical device manufacturers.
Building Quality 5.0 Frameworks for Additive Manufacturing in Energy Applications | Sainyam Arora - Johnson Matthey
As additive manufacturing transitions from prototyping to production, the biggest challenges are ensuring repeatability, reliability and data integrity, according to Sainyam.
He will introduce a Quality 5.0 framework designed to embed ISO 9001:2015 and GMP-aligned quality management principles into AM workflows and provide a roadmap for integrating data integrity and process control directly into AM operations.
Learning objective: Participants will be able to demonstrate methods for integrating digital quality tools and data integrity frameworks to monitor performance and reduce variability across production environments.
Who should attend: Quality engineers, AM process developers, and operations leaders.
Forward-Deployed Manufacturing for Indo-Pacific Readiness: Inside ASTRO America’s GAMMA Initiative | Panel session chaired by Debbie Holton with Converge Consulting, ASTRO America, Roosevelt Group and US Navy.
As operational demands increase across the Indo-Pacific, the U.S. Navy faces persistent challenges in sustainment, supply-chain resilience, and platform readiness at distance.
This session will examine how ASTRO America’s GAMMA initiative is addressing those challenges by establishing a forward-deployed manufacturing hub purpose-built to support naval sustainment and rapid response in contested and remote environments.
Learning objective: Understanding how forward-deployed AM can solve real sustainment and readiness challenges in contested environments.
Who should attend: Defence and aerospace engineers, programme managers, acquisition professionals working in military sustainment and logistics, and policy and government affairs people.
Laura Griffiths, Head of Content
Future of Additive: Design, Simulation, and Artificial Intelligence | Milan P. Raval - Siemens DI SW
Despite the advancements in CAD and simulation tools, challenges around software complexity, computational demands, and the accurate simulation of material interactions persist and often hinder efficiency.
Milan will present how artificial intelligence can deliver a complementary approach to traditional simulation methods, accelerating pre-design decisions, minimising defects, and leveraging historical simulation data to forecast new design outcomes.
Learning objective: Understand how to leverage existing technologies for their projects incorporating design, simulation and artificial intelligence.
Who should attend: Design and simulation engineers, AM process engineers working with complex structural components, and any users of Siemens software.
Operationalizing Advanced Manufacturing: Forging a Decisive Advantage for Our Warfighters | James L. Zunino III, SSTM - US Army DEVCOM
With the US Army rapidly accelerating the adoption of advanced manufacturing methods, James will detail how the US Armed Forces are fostering innovation, cultivating strategic partnerships, and investing in a skilled national workforce, and explain how a dual-focused approach will accelerate the implementation of such technologies.
That two-pronged approach concerns the development of novel capabilities and innovative operational constructs, with the US Army hoping to optimise the broader defence manufacturing ecosystem.
Learning objective: Understand where the US Army and its strategic partners are heading as part of the Army Transformation and what technologies and applications are needed to successfully implement advanced manufacturing.
Who should attend: Defence contractors, AM suppliers, government & policy professionals, and researchers looking to engage with US DEVCOM.
What’s All the Comminution About? A Perspective on Mechanical Recycling for AM | Andrew Neils, PhD - The Roux Institute at Northeastern University
Powder-based additive manufacturing depends on feedstocks with tightly controlled particle size and high sphericity, and mechanical recycling via comminution offers a solid-state pathway to transform metal scrap into AM-ready powders.
In this presentation, Andrew will examine the role of comminution in recycling metals into AM feedstocks, reviewing established mechanical methods for breaking down metal into powders and highlighting the resulting differences in particle size and morphology compared with atomised materials.
Learning objective: To understand what characteristics of powder feedstocks are important and recognise how feedstock size distribution and shape can affect build quality.
Who should attend: Materials scientists, powder metallurgy specialists, sustainability-focused engineers, and anyone in the defence or aerospace supply chain.
Sam Davies, Group Content Manager
Framework for Additive Manufacturing Material Readiness Levels in Aerospace Applications | Paul Gradl - NASA Marshall Space Flight Center
Per Paul, Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) and Manufacturing Readiness Levels (MRL) assume the materials used are already mature and suitable for production. Yet, as AM becomes increasingly integrated into critical aerospace systems, there remains no standardised method for assessing the maturity of AM-specific materials, particularly novel and new metal alloys.
This presentation will propose the Additive Material Readiness Level (AMRL) framework – a structured, quantitative approach for assessing the maturity of additively manufactured alloys.
Learning objective: The structure and purpose of the Additive Material Readiness Level framework, including its developmental gates, evaluation criteria, and its role in supporting material characterisation and system integration.
Who should attend: Aerospace engineers, materials scientists, aerospace and defence program managers, and anyone in the AM materials supply chain.
Distributed Manufacturing: The End of Early Adopters | Ankush Venkatesh - Glidewell Dental
Ankush believes that the promise of distributed manufacturing and decentralised production facilities may have been underestimated. The game-changing levers, he suggests, are small machines making small parts with certified materials.
In-office workflows are being broadly adopted in the healthcare space, but does the modern additive manufacturing ecosystem have the requisite toolset?
Learning objective: To understand the current state of technology and adoption across doctor’s offices to deliver better outcomes for patients with rapid and decentralised manufacturing tools.
Who should attend: Dental professionals, clinic owners, AM technology & materials suppliers, and anyone working in point-of-care manufacturing.
Lessons Learned from over 10,000 Automotive Applications | Brennon White - General Motors
General Motors produces tens of thousands of additive parts annually. And with it comes a wealth of learning.
Brennon will share insights that can help define tools and build a success roadmap for AM implementation.
Learning objective: Attendees will gain insights on benefit analysis and how to inspire stakeholder support.
Who should attend: AM application engineers, automotive and industrial programme leads, and anyone who needs to build internal justification for AM investment.
Going to RAPID + TCT in Boston? Your membership just paid for itself.
TCT Executive Membership gets you free expo access, 20% off the full conference pass, and $100 off the Gala — $525 in savings. Plus 4 issues of our premium print magazine, 12 Deep Dive reports a year, starting with our investigation into closing the loop between AM manufacturers and educators.
