Following the transfer of its eyewear business to its management team, Belgian 3D printing company Materialise invests in Replasia, a Belgian medtech start-up developing personalised, 3D-printed solutions and anatomical analysis software for hip preservation.
Replasia’s flagship product, the 3D Shelf Implant, is a patient-specific implant placed outside the joint capsule. Rather than replacing the hip, it offers a less invasive alternative for selected patients with certain forms of hip dysplasia. It also preserves future treatment options. The start-up began a first-in-human clinical investigation in the Netherlands in August 2025, and already markets HipStudio, a planning service that gives surgeons accurate, anatomy-specific measurements.
How Replasia remains a natural fit for Materialise
As healthcare accounts for around 50% of the company’s revenues, it makes perfect sense to see Materialise sharpen its healthcare portfolio.
In this specific case, Replasia’s portfolio sits alongside Materialise’s own patient-specific acetabular implants (aMace) for complex revision cases. This extends the company’s reach across the full arc of orthopaedic care. Replasia, in turn, gains access to Materialise’s experience in personalised medical devices, digital planning software, and established routes to market.
As hardware becomes increasingly commoditised, the durable advantage shifts toward software, clinical validation, and the workflows that turn a scan into a certified, patient-specific device. This is the very bottleneck CEO Brigitte de Vet-Veithen has flagged for industrialisation.
For an industry still asking how additive scales in healthcare, Materialise is doubling down on clinical applications and digital planning. These are the areas where its expertise is hardest for competitors to match.
Source: Materialise investment announcement, May 28, 2026.
Source: Materialise first-quarter 2026 results.
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