Preface

There is no doubt, Gentlemen, that the public, as a whole, is entitled to the regular and proven products of literary industry, but the advancement of industry requires many attempts, daring hypotheses, imprudence even; and laboratories alone make it possible to achieve the very high temperatures, the rare reactions, the degrees of enthusiasm without which neither the sciences nor the arts would have anything but an over-anticipated future.

(Valéry 1957)

Science marches on, making unprecedented progress every day. Every day our knowledge expands in depth and surface, and at the same time the moral ideal grows. In vain will we struggle against the evidence; it is science that leads the world. Humanity will know no other guide.

(Richet 1895)

Why is philosophy important to engineering? Ultimately and most deeply it is because engineering is philosophy - and through philosophy engineering will become more itself.

(Mitcham 1998)

Technological progress induces a dynamic of movement, insofar as it possesses a directional quality that makes the state of arrival preferable or desirable in relation to the point of departure. This is the basis for the development of innovations, particularly from science. Alas, Sicard (2021) reminds us of the steady decline of the French industrial sector since the end of the Trente Glorieuses (30 years following the end of World War Two in France). This decline is illustrated in Fourastié (1952) and was followed by many governments because it seemed more profitable to them to move toward a post-industrial society consisting solely of service activities. It is only recently that the state has changed its "doctrine", leaving a more appropriate place for technological innovation.

In this context, the French see free trade, globalization and technological change as threats to jobs. Thus, according to Blanchard and Tirole (2021), manufacturing accounts for only 10.4% of employment and 13.4% of GDP in France, compared to 19.7% of GDP in Italy. Meanwhile, having lost 41% of manufacturing jobs in 30 years, the United States is one of the most active players in developing a new manufacturing-oriented vision (Japan and Germany have followed the opposite trend, going from 14.3% to 23.5% and 17.6% to 22.6%, respectively, according to Rynn (2010)). Industrial production is a key element of a country's wealth. According to Sicard (2022), there is a close correlation between a country's industrial production and the GDP/capita of its inhabitants. "Thus, with an industrial production of $6,432 per capita, France has a GDP/capita of 39,030 dollars; with a ratio of $12,279, Germany has a GDP/capita of $46,208; with a record ratio of $22,209, Switzerland is at a GDP/capita of 87,097 dollars". This situation, according to Andreoni and Gregory (2013), is based on, or calls for, the following arguments:

• The manufacturing industry is a crucial source of high-quality jobs, especially with the deployment of industry 4.0 principles and digital science and technology (André 2019).
• Around two-thirds of world trade is still in manually invoiced products (see balance of payments).
• The manufacturing industry is the main driver of economic growth because of its higher productivity and potential for innovation.
• "Human beings are far more capable than robots of dealing with unexpected situations" (Elon Musk, quoted by Alvarez (2018)).
• Technology has complex effects on the structure of production and on the distribution of labor: the replacement of labor by capital, and the elimination of low- and medium-skilled jobs with a high routine component (Blanchard and Tirole 2021).

For Andreoni and Gregory (2013), services only had a significant positive effect on jobs up until 1990, and with coefficients well below those of manufacturing. In the trends highlighted by the latter, one driver of progress in manufacturing is the production of machines using other machines. This may involve manufacturing our own machines (CECIMO 2011), but it is above all a matter of locally envisaging new processes, applicable in many fields (mechanical engineering, construction, computers, healthcare, automotive, aerospace, energy, space, metal fabrication, etc.), which make it possible to cut costs, improve quality and increase productivity, as well as reduce production set-up times.

Indeed, Bartik (2020) shows that financial incentives promote local job creation, as it takes a lot of money to sway a decision to locate or expand a business. So, even when there is a positive impact on employment, the budgetary costs per job preserved or created can be quite high. It can therefore be advantageous to rely on local creators without needing to attract companies whose ethics are sometimes questionable (major tax breaks granted to companies are not always appropriate).

The health crisis also revealed pre-existing problems: difficulties in terms of production and supply of consumer goods, the complexity (extreme fragmentation) of our production systems. Raffard (2021) wonders about the organization of these systems, with the multiplication of players involved at every stage. The supply, quality and accessibility of goods provide a privileged field of observation to reflect on the future evolution of our societies. This tendency toward prediction is as much "the projection of contemporary concerns, hopes and events onto the future" as it is a desire "to act on the present" (Belasco 2006).

But, according to Blanchard and Tirole (2021), on the one hand, state-financed and directed innovation programs lead to decisions on the type of innovations to be encouraged, and second, venture capital plays a relatively important role in financing short-term innovation (in the United States). It naturally favors fields offering investors the prospect of a rapid return on their investment. Lerner (2020) considers that there is a risk of excluding innovations that are profitable in the longer term or that could benefit society as a whole. For its part, China has an unrivalled ability to provide what experts call "a complete value chain", to the detriment of non-Chinese companies. Government guidance funds represent this interconnectivity in action, with global financial support of the order of US$700 billion (Blanchette and CSIS 2021; Luong et al. 2021). Meanwhile, in the West, an updated version of Luddism, an aversion to any job-limiting innovation, may counterbalance the new (Acemoglu and Restrepo 2019).

In several works (André 2017; Demoly and André 2022), we have shown that it is possible to continually change and personalize production and propose innovative solutions for production systems; in doing so, the innovations centered on additive manufacturing or 3D printing (or 4D if additive manufacturing is achieved with materials that can be activated by energy stimulation) act as "innovation bridges". In other words, they transfer their know-how and transform the way goods are produced and services are provided. We have just seen from Blanchard and Tirole (2021) that the direction and pace of technological change depend on many factors, many of which can be influenced by political decisions made by society and public authorities. So, are 4D printing modes, like 3D, among the chosen technologies? Or is it possible to show that, outside of major national or European programs, these emerging fields meet the right criteria for moving from ideas to their application in society?

Everyone knows, at least to a certain extent, that the choice of an already attractive technology depends on a large number of factors, such as production organization, expected gains, return on investment, corporate culture, the ability to hire trained staff and learning conditions for employees. Additive manufacturing - computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) - offers efficiency gains in material consumption and has significantly shortened the period between design and production, while other CAM systems allow increasing control over complex production processes (Mazzoleni 1997; Arnold 2001).

In addition, with the advent of IT, the operation of these productions can be interwoven with service activities and new technologies. The manufacturing industry is based on a "value chain" of activities ranging from basic research to after-sales service (see Figure P.1). This representation of the value chain highlights the potential interdependencies that can have a considerable influence on the possibilities of capitalizing on their innovations, capabilities and market opportunities. In the broadest sense, the aim of this book is to find out where these new manufacturing devices stand in terms of integration and/or strong competitive niches.

Figure P.1. Interacting (and interdependent) elements in the transition from research to applications

P.1. General thoughts on innovation

[N]o latitude of expression would allow us to say [.] that the stream of water built the mill, though it were too ancient for us to know who the builder was. What the stream of water does in the affair, is neither more nor less than this; by the application of an unintelligent impulse to a...