10/23/13

"Made in Belgium" 3D Printed Titanium Spectacles.



Mario Fleurinck, CEO Melotte, combines sustainable state-of-the-art technology with creativity for producing customized spectacles for the optician market. This is the basis of a succesful collaboration between the industrial company Melotte and the famous Belgian designer and optician Patrick Hoet.

Patrick Hoet and his design team developed the first 3D printed spectacles in titanium which are unmakeable using existing conventional manufacturing methods.
 

Congratulations Patrick, Mario and your teams for this great achievement!
 
At the launch of these unique glasses Patrick Hoet and Mario Fleurinck invited the Belgian press to present 3D physic titanium models which are available in the market in seven different combinations of specific lens and nose measurement.
 
Both companies say goodbye to product own tooling and use one 3D file for printing no matter which unique pair of spectacles in titanium!
 
No more stock risks, less use of raw material and energy, less waste and less transport result in an environmental impact reduction of factor 8. 100% local added value "Made in Belgium" with a world wide exposure on different continents.
 

6/6/13

Melotte: National Energy Globe Award Winner, most prestigious sustainability price!

 
Goal of the ENERGY GLOBE AWARD is to present successful sustainable projects focusing on energy efficiency, which conserve and protect planet's resources or that employ renewable energy, to a broad audience.
 
Melotte is proud to be awarded for the Belgian national level of the Energy Globe Award, the most prestigious environmental award worldwide.


An international jury, chaired by Maneka Gandhi, has evaluated all 1.051 submissions from 161 participating countries and selected the national winners which are also still running for the international award, Energy Globe World Award for Sustainability.



Mario Fleurinck, CEO Melotte, transforms contemporary disruptive industrial activities into innovative business models based on a sustainable process called Direct Digital Manufacturing (DDM). "We create local prosperity using a process with an international leverage". Meaning customized state-of-the-art technologies to reduce dramatically the amount of natural resources and energy necessary for production based on Additive Manu-facturing in metals (also called 3D Printing) in a full digital process without using molds.
 
Melotte's outstanding project "Manufacturing without Molds" represents an environmental damage reduction of factor 8 through design optimization, DDM and shorter supply chain focusing on the increase of social, economic as well as ecological added value.
 
"The future economy will rather be driven by welfare than financial prosperity."
 
 
For more information on our project please visit 
 
  

5/23/13

Melotte, finalist Grote Prijs voor Toekomstige Generaties!


"De Stichting voor Toekomstige Generaties" has nominated Melotte as Winner for the Belgian province Limburg to be awarded the  "Grote Prijs 2013" of their organisation. Who the Ambassador of the Future Generations 2013  will become, shall be announced in Brussels on 11 June next.
 
Are you convinced that Melotte with Direct Digital Manufacturing puts the principles of sustainable development into practice daily? Then please do not hesitate to vote here and now via online voting http://gp-toekomstigegeneraties.be/category/kandidaten/
 
and make Melotte the most favourable candidate to win the Price of the Public 
 

Creation and knowledge sharing are two fundamental pillars of our society which allow individuals to develop his or her talents fully and turn them into value.  The result of creation is mainly consumer products – analogue and digital – of which the cradle-to-cradle process has an impact on our society and the planet’s own capacity and health. Keeping both in check and balance will be the major challenge of the  21st century. Melotte translates these challenges into sustainable yet competitive business models and production ecosystems evaluating systematically the impact of manufacturing based on optimal energy and raw material efficiency. Today Melotte realizes an environmental impact decrease of factor 8 in line with the recommandations of the EU Agenda 2020.

Your vote can make the difference as well!

5/21/13

The Aftermarket in 2023: How 3D/4D printing could change the Aftermarket Manufacturing landscape of the future


EPP Conference Frankfurt, June 20t.


Practitioner Point of View:

Mario is a passionate serial entrepreneur with focus on the development of sustainable manufacturing technologies.  With these innovations he aims to create business models that go far beyond the economic globalisation.  He believes that technology and manufacturing are playing a significant role in redesigning our social economic models.  Inspired by his holistic view and in the light of the growing global economic and geopolitical unbalance, Mario emphasizes a decentralised manufacturing approach with focus on optimal energy and material resources management.  

"What if our aftermarket needs would be filled in and materialized by cloud connected 3D-printers using a minimum on energy & raw materials? Will on demand products printed next to the user become reality?

Today we are at the dawn of an evolution in manufacturing that will change the value chain step-by-step. First by integrating digitized product data in cloud based designs and assemblies, followed by a fully digitized manufacturing supply chain; products, at the end of their lifecycle, fully reusable, dematerialized and transformed into new physic parts. Pricing is based on time-of-demand and its impact on the planet’s ecosystems; to be paid in euro’s or carbon credits?"

This is an example of the circular economy as practiced by the Belgian company Melotte and based on Mario Fleurinck’s vision, CEO Melotte and founder of InnoCrowd. 

The combination of digital manufacturing, cradle-to-cradle digital processes and cloud based product management moves after-sales services towards a new paradigm without even mentioning the next wave, 4D printing! 

Do not miss his presentation on 20 June in Frankfurt at the EPP Aftermarket Forum.  Mario will close the conference on a futuristic note... What could the Aftermarket Manufacturing landscape look like in the year 2023.  Looking forward to some interesting discussions on the topic.

1/9/13

How to create sustainable economic growth?

At the beginning of December 2012 Melotte attended several interactive events with focus on shaping the green economic thinking from the base in a creative manner.  
It was a pleasure for Mr Mario Fleurinck, CEO Melotte NV, to meet keynote speaker Mr. José Manuel Barroso (current President of the European Union) at the Voka Congress 2012, Flanders’ Chamber of Commerce and Industry, in Brussels. "Time for extra growth" was the topic of the congress emphasizing the significant role of the enterprises.
 
Together with other experts like Mr Koen Dejonckheere (Gimv) and Mr Ignace Van Doorselaere (Van de Velde) Mario Fleurinck represented the company Melotte during the debate about the Power of Growth and Live Voting by the audience.
That same week in GreenVille (Houthalen, Belgium), the monumental main building of the ancient coalmine, a ZERI (°) training took place within the vision of the Bleu Economy. The main objective was to select and analyse 8 concrete business models and implement them rapidly in 2013.
Mr. Gunter Pauli (Founder of ZERI) explains: “ It is mainly a method or way of thinking for shaping an idea into a business that both serves the needs of our society and is able to be competitive due to the use of local resources." 
(°) ZERI is a global network of creative minds seeking solutions to world challenges
It is no coincidence that Mr Pauli chose GreenVille as training location since it is playing a significant role in the roll out of Limburg as an important European Cleantech (*) region where trainings are organised with experts to initiate people into all aspects of CleanTech giving them insight how transition to CleanTech can lead to a sustainable community.
 
(*) Cleantech is a famous abbreviation of “Clean Technologies” which is a collective noun of products, services and processes based on technologies that optimize the use of natural sources and minimize the environmntal impact.


Today Melotte is proud to announce that Mr Dirk Vandereyt (Melotte Outsourcing and R&D Engineer) was one of the trainees who succeeded in becoming a CleanTech Ambassador (CTA) with expertise in explaining and inspiring others the importance of transition of manufacturing as well as consumption patterns.  

"Congratulations, Dirk!"