Building an Interdisciplinary Additive Manufacturing Ecosystem: A Case Study of TUM.Additive

Abstract

Additive manufacturing (AM) is an intrinsically interdisciplinary technology, spanning materials science, process and mechanical engineering, and design, with applications from construction and aerospace to medicine and the life sciences. Its industrial relevance depends on combining innovative process technologies with strong application potential, yet this is frequently constrained by fragmented expertise across materials, design, and application disciplines. Research entities such as universities tend to reproduce this fragmentation because resources, incentives, and reputation are organised around individual chairs, professorships and departments. This paper asks how an interdisciplinary AM ecosystem is built and coordinated within a university, and which mechanisms enable and constrain that process. We address the question through a single, revelatory case study of TUM.Additive, a mission network at the Technical University of Munich uniting thirty-five chairs and professorships from seven TUM schools and over one hundred researchers, spanning all seven DIN EN ISO/ASTM 52900 process categories and five material groups. We read the case through a triple helix lens, complemented by entrepreneurial ecosystem theory, and analyse it using the network's three coordination mechanisms: Connect, Collaborate, and Communicate. This study highlights that intra-university ecosystem building depends on the active, coordinated operation of these three mechanisms to overcome institutional friction. It contributes to the triple helix and entrepreneurial ecosystem literatures by extending them to the underexamined intra-university level, offering a transferable framework for research-network builders.