Italian Contract Manufacturer Ci-Esse Srl Acquires a Velo3D Sapphire Printer to Enhance its Additive Manufacturing Capabilities

The Company’s Fully Integrated Solution Will Be Used to Support Ci-Esse’s Aerospace, Defense, and Motorsports Customers by Providing Mission Critical Metal Parts

Velo3D, Inc. (NYSE: VLD), today announced Ci-Esse Srl, a precision machining contract manufacturer with more than 15 years of experience in additive manufacturing, has purchased a Sapphire printer from Velo3D to become the first member of its contract manufacturer network in Italy. This new, fully integrated metal additive manufacturing solution will be used to produce parts for Ci-Esse's customers in aerospace, defense, motorsports, and other industries. Ci-Esse’s Sapphire printer will be calibrated to produce parts using Inconel 718 metal powder and will reside in the company’s additive manufacturing facility in Fiorano Modenese, Italy.

“With more than 40 years of experience in precision machining, 15 years using metal additive manufacturing technology, and a deep-rooted passion to solve their customers’ most difficult problems, it’s no surprise that Ci-Esse has developed unique processes and capabilities—from printing parameters and quality control to post-processing—that help them stand out among their peers,” said Benny Buller, Velo3D Founder and CEO. “The overlap of industries served by Velo3D and Ci-Esse is quite extensive, and I foresee a long and fruitful partnership where we learn from one another as we serve our joint customers. We look forward to seeing what their customers produce with Ci-Esse’s new 3D printing capabilities.”

Ci-Esse was founded in 1978 and has a large number of customers across space, aviation, defense, industrial tooling, racing, and automotive. Prior to 2007, Ci-Esse's business focused on conventional manufacturing technologies. Since then, Ci-Esse has adopted advanced manufacturing technologies, like additive manufacturing, to differentiate itself from the competition. Its customers utilize Ci-Esse’s manufacturing capabilities to procure ready-to-use parts to support their various product lines and service offerings. The company’s extensive legacy is due to its focus on delivering quality parts that meet every aspect of its customers’ specifications. The company is AS9100D certified and maintains a metallurgical laboratory to monitor the quality of the powder used in its additive manufacturing processes.

“One of our core values at Ci-Esse is to strive for perfection in every part we deliver to a customer,” said Giorgio Canali, Ci-Esse CEO. “Velo3D’s solution, with its quality assurance and pre-print software, is an excellent complement to our extensive history of delivering parts produced with the highest quality. The fully integrated solution will help us monitor the quality of the parts we produce for our customers to add an extra level of validation in our quality.”

Within the laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) industry, Velo3D has been able to differentiate itself with its solution that combines software and manufacturing processes with its metal 3D printers. The fully integrated solution streamlines the pre-print process, ensures quality in every layer of a 3D printed part, and enables reputability from one Sapphire printer to another. This allows engineers to easily scale production to new printers without having to complete the extensive process of qualification. This approach will allow Ci-Esse to produce parts for existing Velo3D customers with minimal effort. As its customers need to scale their production, Ci-Esse can simply add additional printers to meet its customer’s needs.

About Velo3D:

Velo3D is a metal 3D printing technology company. 3D printing—also known as additive manufacturing (AM)—has a unique ability to improve the way high-value metal parts are built. However, legacy metal AM has been greatly limited in its capabilities since its invention almost 30 years ago. This has prevented the technology from being used to create the most valuable and impactful parts, restricting its use to specific niches where the limitations were acceptable.

Velo3D has overcome these limitations so engineers can design and print the parts they want. The company’s solution unlocks a wide breadth of design freedom and enables customers in space exploration, aviation, power generation, energy, and semiconductor to innovate the future in their respective industries. Using Velo3D, these customers can now build mission-critical metal parts that were previously impossible to manufacture. The fully integrated solution includes the Flow print preparation software, the Sapphire family of printers, and the Assure quality control system—all of which are powered by Velo3D’s Intelligent Fusion manufacturing process. The company delivered its first Sapphire system in 2018 and has been a strategic partner to innovators such as SpaceX, Honeywell, Honda, Chromalloy, and Lam Research. Velo3D has been named as one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies for 2023. For more information, please visit Velo3D.com, or follow the company on LinkedIn or Twitter.

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release includes “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the “safe harbor” provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1996. The Company’s actual results may differ from its expectations, estimates and projections and consequently, you should not rely on these forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. Words such as “expect”, “estimate”, “project”, “budget”, “forecast”, “anticipate”, “intend”, “plan”, “may”, “will”, “could”, “should”, “believes”, “predicts”, “potential”, “continue”, and similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements include, without limitation, the Company’s expectations regarding its growth and the Company’s other expectations, hopes, beliefs, intentions, or strategies for the future. These forward-looking statements involve significant risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results to differ materially from the expected results. You should carefully consider the risks and uncertainties described in the documents filed by the Company from time to time with the SEC. These filings identify and address other important risks and uncertainties that could cause actual events and results to differ materially from those contained in the forward-looking statements. Most of these factors are outside the Company’s control and are difficult to predict. The Company cautions not to place undue reliance upon any forward-looking statements, including projections, which speak only as of the date made. The Company does not undertake or accept any obligation to release publicly any updates or revisions to any forward-looking statements to reflect any change in its expectations or any change in events, conditions, or circumstances on which any such statement is based.

Velo, Velo3D, Sapphire, and Intelligent Fusion, are registered trademarks of Velo3D, Inc. Without Compromise, Flow and Assure, are trademarks of Velo3D, Inc.

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