Although the official policy line in Europe is that rese- The addition of smart mould sensor systems to the injection arch and development is at the forefront of its politi- process. cal priorities, in practice major cutbacks have been made in budgets given over to R+D since governments find it less difficult to justify this type of reduction to voters. Deci- sions like these are putting the country’s future at risk, with the drastic consequences such as progressive deindustrialisa- tion, brain drains and a non-existent industrial network that puts job creation for young people at grave risk. At Ascamm, 170 researchers from 10 different countries work towards developing knowledge and technology to lay the foundations for sustainable reindustrialisation in Europe, promoting innovative projects and the active participation of small and medium companies in this process. Several international cooperation projects have led to development of technologies that improve energy efficiency in the process, increase the quality of manufactured parts and reduce production costs in plants. Advances made at the Technology Centre have enabled costs to be reduced in a process that is plagued with high produc- tion costs at manufacturing plants within the metalworking industry. This in turn has led to much more flexible, high- tech processes. Acamm is working on a number of projects and highly promising research results are creating a lot of interest amongst a number of companies in the metal casting sector. For example, the Ascamm-coordinated Ultra-SSM project studied the effects of ultrasounds on solidifying aluminium. This highly innovative project gave the team the opportunity to create an adaptable, low-cost unit for conventional casting machinery, which enables semi-solid state aluminium to be created and transformed. A highly globular microstructure In recent years, Ascamm has focused its efforts on the crea- tion of in-house technology, and in this respect it has conso- lidated a meteoric career that has given shape to over 30 patents that protect 10 technological developments. The technology centre is working on several lines of rese- arch in the metallurgy industry, including: Development of light alloy processing technologies. New additive manufacturing technologies based on the application of energy via different types of waves. Micro-fabrication of metal pieces using incremental defor- mation technologies. Development of structural parts for aeronautics. Casting: a clean processing technology? / 27 Report