About Fenix

THE MAIN AIM of FENIX is the development of new business models and industrial strategies for three novel supply chains in order to enable value-added product-services. To this aim, three pilot plants will be implemented:

  1. A modular, multi-material and reconfigurable pilot plant producing 3D printing metal powders.
  2. A modular, multi-material and reconfigurable pilot plant producing customized jewels.
  3. A modular, multi-material and reconfigurable pilot plant producing 3D printing advanced filaments.

All the three pilot plants will share the same structure.  They will be designed also to host and fully exploit industry 4.0 solutions represented by smart sensors able to send real-time data to the online marketplace developed in FENIX. This will enhance the sharing of overcapacity among different supply chains from very different sectors, the involvement of private end users in industrial processes as well as the provision of new services to companies, for the monitoring and control of the pilot plant.

THE SECOND AIM of FENIX is the representation of a set of success stories coming from the application of CIRCULAR ECONOMY PRINCIPLES in different industrial sectors. FENIX will demonstrate how the adoption of circular economy principles can enable more sustainable supply chains, by increasing quality, market value and alternative exploitation of secondary materials. FENIX will enable a concrete sharing of capacity among different industrial contexts and the active participation of local communities in industrial processes. This will enable a long lasting European leadership in innovative manufacturing plants engineering.

THE THIRD AIM of FENIX is the integration of Key Enabling Technologies (KETs) for the efficient recovery of secondary resources. FENIX will support the integration of different KETs within a unique industrial plant. Industry 4.0 and circular economy principles will be taken into account in the project, in order to enhance the development of innovative business models and supply chains based on new kinds of product-service concepts. Essentially, three types of KETs will be considered by FENIX:

  1. Advanced manufacturing systems: a wide number of sensors will be embedded within each module constituting the FENIX pilot plant.
  2. Industrial biotechnology: since the initial steps, FENIX taken into account the exploitation of biometallurgy for the sustainable recovery of materials from different kinds of wastes.
  3. Nanotechnology: this kind of material technologies enables an improvement of mechanical properties of materials, as well as thermal and electrical conductivity and functional properties.

 

These three aims are represented all together in the following Figure 1, which represents how circular economy principles and digital tools will be used in the project to implement and test the three different modules constituting the FENIX pilot plant, using an iterative flow of data and knowledge between different actors involved in the supply chain.

 

Figure 1 – Overall concept of the FENIX project