An extended feasibility study to identify laser welding and laser.arc hybrid welding business cases and business models

The laser research group at Lulea University of Technology has, in collaboration withSwedish industries, performed more than 20 laser welding and laser arc hybrid welding casestudies during the last decade. Most of them can be considered as successful and havedemonstrated improved mechanical properties, new design opportunities and higher weldingproductivity. Nevertheless, very few of the successful case studies have resulted in anindustrial application and the number of industrial implementations is still very limited. Thereare of course several reasons, like company organisation, human factors or lack of experience,but usually it is a rational analysis based on return of investment. The case studies are alsousually limited to one component at one company without any further evaluation and analysisof other business opportunities, i.e. other components/products within the company orforming a cluster of companies in a geographic region. This paper presents an extend analysesof a number of the performed case studies with the objectives to evaluate and identifybusiness cases. Different business models, such as investigate product families for laserwelding within a company and company clusters with common laser welding resource, isevaluated and analysed.