In 2021, we are celebrating the 30th year of RAPID + TCT. For the past three decades, RAPID + TCT has served as North America’s annual meeting place for the additive manufacturing community, bringing together buyers and sellers of the technology to learn, network, and advance the industry. To honor our 30 years, we put together a timeline of the event’s rich history serving the additive manufacturing industry.
Here’s a timeline of our history:
1990: First SME “RAPID” conference held as Rapid Prototyping/Stereolithography.
1993: The Rapid Prototyping Association of SME (SME/RPA) founded, which is today known as the Additive Manufacturing Community.
1997: First book on medical applications, Rapid Prototyping Technology: A Unique Approach to the Diagnosis and Planning of Medical Procedures, published by SME.
2003: RPA became Rapid Technologies and Additive Manufacturing (RTAM) Community. First Additive Manufacturing Certificate program. First Dick Aubin Distinguished Paper Award presented at RAPID by SME’s Additive Manufacturing Community.
2006: Rapid Prototyping and Manufacturing changed to RAPID in recognition of the technology growing beyond prototyping.
2007: SME/RTAM petitioned NIST to develop standards for additive manufacturing.
2008: Industry Achievement Award established by SME to recognize an individual, team or company for outstanding accomplishments that have impacted the additive manufacturing industry. First recipient of award is Prof. Dr. Gideon Levy. SME/RTAM approached ASTM to form a committee to develop additive manufacturing standards.
2009: ASTM committee, F42, on Additive Manufacturing Technologies formed. Andrew Christensen receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2010: Rethia B. Williams receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2011: Wilfried Vancraen, founder of Materialise, receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2012: Brent Stucker and Pat Picariello receive SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2013: First Medical Manufacturing Innovations (MMI) program at RAPID. Scott Crump, the inventor of fused deposition modeling (FDM) technology, receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2014: SME Medical AM/3DP Workgroup created. FDA holds workshop on additive manufacturing of medical devices. Charles Hull, the inventor of stereolithography, receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2015: Tooling U-SME launched the 2.0 version of all classes, including their Additive Manufacturing Training courses. Greg M. Morris receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2016: SME and Rapid News Publications, Ltd, announced partnership to produce RAPID + TCT. SME Medical AM/3DP Workgroup successfully approaches DICOM standards committee (control all of medical imaging) to establish a Working Group (WG-17) to integrate needs of 3D printing into standard. EOS Founder Dr. Hans J. Langer receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2017: Dieter Schwarze, PhD, one of the primary inventors of selective laser melting, receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2018: Carl Deckard, PhD and Joseph Beaman, ScD, the co-inventors of selective laser sintering (SLS), receive SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
2019: Ely Sachs, PhD, the inventor of binder jet printing and a co-founder of Desktop Metal, receives SME Additive Manufacturing Industry Achievement Award.
In addition to preparing for our largest RAPID + TCT yet, we’ve reached out to long-time attendees to see why they keep coming back year after year. We’ve spoken with Carl Dekker (President of Met-L-Flo Inc.), Sheku Kamara (Dean of Applied Research at the Milwaukee School of Engineering), Howard Arthur Kuhn (Executive in Residence, Swanson School of Engineering, University of Pittsburgh), and Michael Raphael (President & Chief Engineer, Direct Dimensions, Inc).
References
http://www.sme.org/sme-history/
https://www.sme.org/aboutsme/awards/industry-achievement-award/industry-achievement-award-winners/