Following the success of the 2025 RAPDASA Conference, joined by RobMech, PRASA and AMI, hosted at the CSIR International Convention Centre in Pretoria, South Africa on 27 to 30 October 2025, we are pleased to announce the Call for Abstracts for the 2026 RAPDASA-AMI international conference to be held on 26 – 30 October 2026. The venue is yet to be confirmed. RAPDASA will again be joined by the South African Advanced Materials Initiative (AMI).

This conference will bring together experts from industry, research and development (R&D)institutions, academia and students, in additive manufacturing, materials engineering, rapid product development and advanced manufacturing to present their research, development and implementation and to network to expand the fraternity that has been built by the previous conferences.

The theme of the 2026 conference is:

 From Prototype to Production: Translating Research into Reality

Opportunities will be offered for local and international participants from industry, R&D institutions, academia and government, to connect and collaborate to grow the next generation of product development and advanced manufacturing enterprises in Africa and globally by implementation of R&D.

Conference papers on the following topics are welcomed:

• Product Design and Development
• Materials Selection for Design
• Additive Manufacturing
• Rapid Prototyping
• Advanced Manufacturing
• Computer-aided Design
• Reverse Engineering
• Design, Simulation and Modelling
• Computational Analytics
• Process Modelling
• Structural Analysis
• Materials Engineering
• Materials Processing
• Tooling Design and Development
• Artificial Intelligence
• Machine Learning
• End-user Applications and Systems
• Knowledge Based Systems
• Information Technology Applied to Manufacturing
• Robotics and Automation
• Management of Research and Technology
• Education and Training
• Agile Manufacturing
• Renewable Energy Applications

Who should attend?

The Organizing Committee invites product designers, engineers, production staff, technical directors and managers from industry involved in design, development and manufacturing of products and components to submit an abstract and present their work or simply attend the conference. In addition, participants from international product development and materials engineering communities, academia and R&D institutions are invited to participate in the conference through submission of full papers. Additive manufacturing, rapid product development, digitalisation and automation have become crucially important in the international advanced manufacturing industry. Ample opportunities will be available to meet with experts in the field.

Important dates deadlines

• First announcement and call for abstracts for 2026 conference: 15 December 2025

• Deadline for submission of abstracts: 16 March 2026

• Notification of acceptance of abstracts: 30 March 2026

• Deadline for submission of full papers: 8 June 2026

• Feedback on paper reviews: 3 August 2026

• Submission deadline for poster text: 31 August 2026

• Submission deadline for final revised papers: 31 August 2026

• Submission deadline for poster designs: 28 September 2026

Please see the Conference abstract & paper submission for instructions on how to submit an abstract to the conference.

Publication of papers

Abstracts must first be accepted before submission of a full paper can proceed. All papers submitted for the conference will be subjected to a double-blind peer review process, which will be led by the Technical Committee. Papers accepted after peer review will be published in the conference proceedings in MATEC Web of Conferences. Selected papers that comply with the scope of the journal and are of high quality, will be submitted for publication in the ISI accredited The South African Journal of Industrial Engineering (SAJIE).

Industry presentations

As an alternative to the above publication of peer-reviewed papers, industry participants can present their applied research in a non-peer-reviewed format. Only an abstract of 300 words length must be submitted for such industry presentations. Industry presentations are not included in the conference proceedings.

The deadline for industry abstracts is 16 March  2026

Companies or organisations that wish to be a sponsor of the conference proceedings may contact Rynette Coetzer at info@rapdasa.org