Shaping the Future of Manufacturing: Women Driving Additive Innovation in Australia
- Mar 11
- 4 min read
International Women’s Day is an opportunity to celebrate progress - but also to recognise the people actively shaping the future of industry.
In additive manufacturing (AM), a technology transforming how products are designed, produced and repaired, women are playing an incre
asingly important role across research, engineering, industry adoption and workforce development.
To mark International Women’s Day 2026, we share the stories of three professionals contributing to Australia’s AM ecosystem – each bringing a different perspective from research, heavy industry and advanced manufacturing.
Together, their stories reflect how AM is not only reshaping production, but also opening new pathways into manufacturing careers.
Expanding the Possibilities of Design and Production
For Dr Natalie Haskell, AM opened a new way of thinking about design, following a career in design and manufacturing.
Now a Senior Lecturer and Program Director in Industrial Design at Griffith University and Education and Training Program Lead at the A
dditive Manufacturing CRC, Haskell has worked with additive technologies for almost 15 years.
What first drew her to the field was the freedom it offered.
“The design possibilities blew me away, after coming from traditional manufacturing where you were designing for a range of constraints, compared to AM technologies I started designing for at the time, such as SLS, where the opportunities for mass customisation, part complexity and on-demand manufacturing were achievable and viable,” Haskell explained.
Today, Haskell’s work focuses on building industry capability, ensuring designers, engineers and manufacturers understand how to harness AM effectively.
She points to the growing maturity of the technology, with global companies like Airbus using AM for series parts, while Australian SMEs are increasingly adopting it throughout workflows.
At the Coomera Marine Precinct near Griffith University, for example, AM is being used by local marine manufacturers to support prototyping, tooling and customised components.
“There’s a supportive ecosystem for girls and women considering a career in the industry,” Haskell added, citing global initiatives such as the Women in 3D Printing network and local manufacturing programs supporting industry diversity and STEM initiatives in schools.
“There are opportunities for them to connect with women in AM: it is quite a supportive network or ecosystem,” she said.
“In my experience, women in AM genuinely want to see other women succeed, and I’ve personally benefited from that supportive network.”
Bridging Traditional and Advanced Manufacturing
For Kaitlyn Eckermann, AM represents the next evolution of an industry she entered through the trades.
Eckermann began her career in what she describes as “traditional” manufacturing as a fitter and turner apprentice at about age 21. Her first exposure to 3D printing was to make pump parts and seals as part of TAFE classes.
Today, Eckermann works as an Australian Industry Capability Specialist at the nation’s submarine builder and sustainer, ASC, while also undertaking a PhD at Adelaide University examining industrial interest in but cautious uptake of metal AM.
“Anytime you think you can do something faster, you kind of approach it with a little bit of scepticism, and rightly so,” she explained.
“My PhD is all about that hesitation to take up AM in industry, and why, what's driving that, where's the bias, are the standards sufficient, is the research sufficient. And that complements work very well.”
She described AM as a collection of reasonably new technologies, with many problems still to be solved, as well as a good stepping stone for moving workers with more traditional skills onto more automated processes.
“Because this field is so young and early in development, relatively speaking to casting and stuff like that, we can come in straight away with a really good balance of gender and backgrounds and experience,” Eckermann said, adding that she was the only girl in her year at trade school.
“It's not just all young men in there, it's older workers, younger workers, people that are coming straight in from university or people that are upskilling who have been tradies for 30 years. And that's encouraging.”
Designing for Performance, Not Process
For Mindula Rathnayake, the appeal of AM lies in the “shifting design philosophy it represents.”
After graduating as a mechanical engineer (with honours) from Swinburne University, Rathnayake landed a six-month contract Graduate Project Engineer role at AM specialist SPEE3D. She has remained at the company and now works as a Manufacturing Engineer.
Her work includes designing parts, dealing with customers, suppliers and the purchasing team, and engineering documentation for SPEE3D’s cold spray AM systems, which are used in defence, mining and industrial applications around the world.
What initially fascinated Rathnayake was how AM changes the relationship between design and production.
“I was trained to design within manufacturing constraints… But when I was first exposed to AM, I realised we could reverse that thinking instead of designing for the process, we could design for performance and let the process adapt to the geometry.”
“That was really transformative for me.”
Rathnayake believes there are good opportunities for young women in her industry, which she said is still relatively young and experiencing significant skills shortages.
“3D printing provides opportunities for women across the entire value chain, in my opinion. From design to increasingly senior leadership roles; some of the senior leadership roles at the company are women."
“I've seen some women throughout my professional journey at design, engineering, R&D, production, operations, logistics, leadership and business development."
A Growing Industry and Opportunity
Additive manufacturing remains one of the fastest-evolving areas within advanced manufacturing.
As Australia works to strengthen sovereign manufacturing capability and build more resilient supply chains, the demand for new skills — across design, engineering, materials science and digital manufacturing — continues to grow.
For the women working at the forefront of the technology, that growth represents both an industry opportunity and a chance to shape a more inclusive future for manufacturing.
As Eckermann put it: “Because the technology is still developing, we have the opportunity to build the workforce differently from the start.”
