A smartphone frame and a smartwatch case are easy to spot; the tiny cooling channels inside an AI server are not. But for HG Laser, a subsidiary of Wuhan-based HGTECH Group, independently developed industrial metal 3D printing can make all the precise parts.

Zhang Shizhuo, assistant general manager of the company's 3D printing division, said that compared with conventional computer numerical control machining, laser 3D printing has greatly shortened production time and lowered the costs in making consumer electronics components.