No, additive manufacturing will not replace mass production processes any time soon. However, as a supporting technology, it can improve mould-making processes drastically, upgrading manufacturing efficiency.
For several years now, there has been a lot of talk about disruptive innovations and technologies. A number of trends are said to be able to change the manufacturing industry forever. Smart manufacturing, digitisation, Industry 4.0 and lately also 5G are set to disrupt how we work. In all these cases, what is meant is that if the technology succeeds, it will change and transform existing markets and value networks. The problem is that no one can truly say whether a technology succeeds or not.