- By combining the additive manufacturing (AM)-process with digital concepts, such as the digital twin (DT) or the digital part file (DPF), the competitiveness of additive manufacturing is increased. A quantitative approach to evaluate the usage of a DPF in AM will be introduced within this paper. The focus is set on the production as an early lifecycle-phase, which means that the AM-production process gets analyzed regarding potential advantages of using a DPF. These advantages are transferred into a monetary value with our approach. By calculating the total costs of the DPF, a monetary overall value is obtained.
