Message posted on
13 November 2025 by HIVE
On November 12, 2025, we organized a combined event within HIVE between the Regional Deal Central and West Brabant and the Development Center for Maintenance of Composites (DCMC).
It was a great opportunity to review various initiatives in the field of innovation in MRO and beyond, and to look for similarities and common ground. Regio Deal, DCMC and HIVE all promote collaboration between businesses, government bodies and knowledge institutions to create smarter, more sustainable solutions. This was the common theme throughout the day.
During a panel discussion, the results and lessons learned from the projects subsidised by Regio Deal over the past five years were discussed. The central theme was “smarter and more sustainable”. DCMC was one of the beneficiaries, with activities in the field of life-extending, innovative maintenance of composite materials, which are also increasingly being used in aviation. By bringing together companies from different sectors to share knowledge and develop new techniques, DCMC contributes to better and more efficient working with composites. This is achieved, among other things, with new methods for detecting and repairing damage and by replacing manual work with automated processes.
Other projects reviewed by the panel focused on food, bio-based materials, transport and learning. All of them had “smarter and more sustainable” as their common theme. After the panel discussion, all the results were officially presented in the form of a final report to Jacqueline Kuppens of the Ministry of the Interior.
The program continued with a presentation by Rick van Opdorp of ACRATS. In collaboration with various parties, he is currently establishing a Structure Center of Excellence within HIVE, at Business Park Aviolanda. This center will combine innovation and training in sheet metal and composites. Jason Hwang of NLR then took over to explain the ARBI. This innovation in Automated Rotor Blade Inspection is currently being further developed in the HIVE Living Lab – Hangar of the Future. Finally, a presentation from TU Delft covered the latest developments in Predictive Maintenance. The day concluded with an informal setting for networking.
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