India, April 3 -- Old school distribution cycles continue to transform as cloud resources make it increasingly possible to support on demand production rather than waiting for traditioanl supply chains to catch up.

Satair, a supplier of aircraft components and a subsidiary of Airbus, explored such possibilities with a pilot program to provide faster access to tools for maintenance on planes. The demands of safety and rigors of time mean aircraft must have the proper tools available to keep flying, says Felix Hammerschmidt, head of additive manufacturing solutions at Satair. His company entered into a pilot with Fast Radius, a provider of industrial-grade, additive manufacturing to speed up the availability of tools for aircraft maintenan...