The Institute

The Institute of Manufacturing Technology, founded in 1982, focuses on metal forming. Since its foundation, the focus of the research activities of the more than 60 employees of the institute has been on sheet metal and bulk forming. Almost 50% of the scientific staff work in the research groups associated with these subject areas. Since Prof. Merklein took over the institute in 2008, the main research areas have been continuously developed. The range of topics includes the areas: sheet metal forming, bulk forming, manufacturing processes, tailor-made semi-finished products, material characterization and modelling, mechanical joining and hybrid additive manufacturing.

The LFT is considered one of the leading international research institutions in the field of forming technology and is equally excellently networked in science and industry. The work in the field of forming technology is not exclusively focused on the automotive environment; competence in the field of electronics production has been developed and expanded for many years. In addition, a large number of research projects on questions of forming technology, digitization, tool and semi-finished product technologies have been and are being processed at the Chair of Manufacturing Technology.