Tag Archives: MakerBot
3D Systems CEO Predicts Moore’s Law Will Hit 3D Printing Technology – Inside 3D Printing Chicago
3D Printing Will Change the Face of Business
Avi Reichental, President and CEO of 3D Systems, opened up this morning’s keynote speech at Inside 3D Printing Chicago with an enthusiastic and insightful view of the present and future of 3D printing. His presentation, Manufacturing the Future, focused on the democratization of 3D printing that will make it ubiquitous and empower anyone to become a maker. For example, one thing 3D Sytems has done is offer the service Cubify, which allows people to use their industrial printers to make objects in plastics, nylon and Zprint. Reichental noted, “whether you’re a deep pocketed corporation or a garage entrepreneur looking to start, it gives anyone access to 3D printing through the cloud.”
Throughout his presentation, he pointed to examples of how 3D printing already impacts our lives in will exponentially continue to do so. From applications in medicine to fashion to automotive, he is a firm believer that additive manufacturing will be an integral part of our everyday lives both in the industrial world and in the comfort of our own homes. He explained how Moore’s Law has begun for this industry and that, “printers are going to double up on performance and double down on costs. Expect printers to become real powerful home appliances. The train has left the station.” Bre Pettis at MakerBot for example, has been a key figure in beginning the process of lowering price to make printers accessible for regular consumers.
Despite rapid growth, there are numerous skeptics that ask: Does 3D printing really scale? Reichental however, emphatically answered “absolutely yes!” To answer skeptics, Reichental presented the example of Invisalign. Last year, he noted, 17.2 million Invisalign braces were made. Each one of them was manufactured in a 3D printing, 24/7, lights out manufacturing faciility. What is also amazing is that each of these designs are unique and distinct to adapt to people’s mouths. Furthermore, it seems like GE believes it will scale with over $3 billion they have invested in advanced digital manufacturing.
To put his money where his mouth is in terms of democratizing 3D printing, Reichental announced two important partnerships for 3D Systems. The first is a partnership with Google – Motorola, where 3D systems has outfitted Google/Moto trucks with their latest technology in order to teach people, mainly teens, how to use 3D printing technology. The trucks will go around college campuses, maker fairs and any other type of creative space where people want to create. The trucks will have the ProJet 3510 and the Projet 460 plus.
On the industrial end, Reichental announced, “this morning we have launched a game changing partnership with Deloitte Consulting to accelerate the way that companies can harness, adapt and implement this disruptive technology into their business model and their manufacturing operations.“ Together, they seek to help companies get educated about the technology and make decisions directionally on what they can do. After speaking with 3D Systems Chief Marketing Officer, Cathy Lewis, it is clear that education is a big focus for the company and clearly they are doing something concrete about it with these major partnerships. In sum, Reichental believes that this revolution is just beginning and we can expect to see completely new ways to design and manufacture from architecture to medicine and almost anything we can imagine.
Authored by On 3D Printing contributor Rodrigo Garza Zorrilla, technology entrepreneur and advisor.
Avi Reichental image courtesy of @3dsystemscorp. Other photos by On 3D Printing.
Inside 3D Printing Conference Chicago: Day 1 Top Stories
Inside 3D Printing Chicago: Day 1
Day 1 of the Inside 3D Printing conference in Chicago kicked off in high gear and built momentum throughout the day. Below are the top stories from the day.
MakerBot and Stratasys Take Center Stage at the Inside 3D Printing Chicago Keynote
Scott Crump of Stratasys and Bre Pettis of MakerBot kicked off the Inside 3D Printing conference in Chicago with a vision of the future 3D printing.
3D Printing Sparks Innovations in Art – MGX by Materialise at Inside 3D Printing Chicago
Joris Debo talks about a brave new art world pioneered by Materialise with their Mammoth Stereolithography 3D printing technology.
Microsoft Confirms Plans to Take 3D Printing to the Masses at Inside 3D Printing Chicago
Microsoft wants to create a consumer operating system that is available to everybody that works fluidly with 3D printing.
Top Photos from Inside 3D Printing Chicago Conference Day 1
We are covering the Inside 3D Printing conference in Chicago this week. Here are some of our top photos from the conference on day 1.
Stay tuned or follow us on Twitter @on3dprinting for more updates from Day 2.
Microsoft Confirms Plans to Take 3D Printing to the Masses at Inside 3D Printing Chicago
Software giant seeks to make 3D printing seamless for home use
In late June, during their annual Build Conference, Microsoft announced that Windows 8.1 would support 3D printing. This sparked many questions among people as to why Microsoft would get involved and how would they get involved. Jesse McGatha, a 14-year veteran at Microsoft, is one of the key people in charge of leading 3D printing innovation within the software giant.
Today, at the Inside 3D Printing Conference in Chicago, Mr. McGatha began his talk by addressing the question: Why would Microsoft be involved in 3D printing? He explained, “when you have over 70% of 3D printing already happening on a Windows operating system, it makes sense that Windows actually supports that.”
McGatha expressed that one of his main goals is to have an application that can talk to a server and can talk to a device in a clean and consistent way. Moreover, Microsoft will focus on the individual home consumer and on how to can make that user experience as simple and as seamless as possible. Microsoft wants to create a “consumer operating system that is available to everybody” that works fluidly with 3D printing.
Essentially, Microsoft is looking to make 3D printing a plug-and-play process. Now that the cost of 3D printers is becoming accessible for individuals to have at their home thanks to innovations from MakerBot, among others, it is important to have a PC operating system that makes it very simple for people to 3D print things.
Jesse McGatha showed the audience a sample user interface for how Windows 8.1 would interact with 3D printers (see gallery below). While the actual product might look different when it comes to market, the idea is to make the printing process very similar to how a user would go about printing a regular Word doc or PowerPoint presentation today. Some things as simple as having print queues and a print spooler are features Microsoft is tackling to make the user experience straightforward.
At the moment, 3D printing can be a tedious process that requires multiple different software packages and several programs to connect the computer to the 3D printers. The complex process can be a deterrent for the mass adoption of 3D printing technology in the household.
After listening to Mr. McGatha, it is obvious why Microsoft would jump into the industry to make it user friendly and help catalyze bringing 3D printers into people’s homes.
Authored by On 3D Printing contributor Rodrigo Garza Zorrilla, technology entrepreneur and advisor.
MakerBot and Stratasys Take Center Stage at the Inside 3D Printing Chicago Keynote
MakerBot and Stratasys Share a Vision for the Future of 3D Printing
Two industry giants, Scott Crump and Bre Pettis, lay out their vision.
Scott Crump, Chairman of the Board of Stratasys, and Bre Pettis, CEO of MakerBot, kicked off the Inside 3D Printing conference in Chicago this morning with an exciting vision of a future where 3D printing becomes a part of our daily life.
It all began in the late 80s, when Scott Crump wanted to make a toy frog for his daughter. Scott and his wife Lisa built the frog, and with it the first 3D printer, with little more than a glue gun and a toy plotter in their kitchen. A passion was born, and after the food started tasting like plastic, they moved the operation to the garage. In 1989, they patented the first FDM (fused deposition modeling) machine, or 3D printer. Today Scott Crump is Chairman of the Board and Chief Innovation Officer of Stratasys, the largest commercial 3D printer company in the world. With over 30,000 printers sold, Stratasys has a global presence and annual revenues of over $350 million. They currently produce over fifty five percent of the commercial 3D printers in the market.
“Welcome to Stratasys and welcome to a 3D world,” passionately stated Scott Crump, “where the only limitation is your own imagination.” Crump emphasized how it’s amazing that a toy froggy led to building an exoskeleton that allows a girl to have fully functional limbs. In addition to turning manufacturing on its head, 3D printing will have a positive impact on people’s lives. “The manufacturing revolution has started and it’s not changing slowly,” says Crump. “Stratasys looks forward to leading the way to a future where we will see millions of 3D printers from home to industrial use.”
Crump then introduced Bre Pettis, the co-founder and CEO of MakerBot, who spoke about his journey into the 3D printing world that has made these printers accessible to consumers. He mentioned that he and his co-founders Adam and Zach began playing with the idea of 3D printing in 2007 at the hacker space, NYC Resistor. By January 2009, they founded MakerBot, which has recently been acquired by Stratasys for $403 million. Much like Scott and Lisa Crump started in their kitchen, Pettis mentioned how they “started as three guys, a laser cutter and a dream.”
After speaking to friends that they saw a future where you could download objects, they came up with Thingiverse where the latest challenge is for someone to come up with a birdhouse to download. Thingiverse has just launched a customizer where people who don’t know what CAD stands for, can design their own iPhone case design. Pettis mentioned, “Consumers now live in a world where they don’t have to choose between two products,” they can make one for themselves. He set forth his favorite example of a toy train track that can be made functional through 3D printing.
Scott Crump and Bre Pettis emphasized that 3D printing is here to stay and will become ubiquitous in our lives.
Authored by On 3D Printing contributors Rodrigo Garza Zorrilla, technology entrepreneur and advisor, and Lisa M. Pérez, co-founder of Heart Design Inc.
3D Printed Batteries Showcased as Future Energy Solution
In a recent Science Friday episode on NPR, the topic was “Aiming For ‘Wild and Crazy’ Energy Ideas“. The Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, backs energy technologies that are too risky for investors, but offer a potentially huge payoff—if they work. The agency has gambled on flywheels, compressed air energy storage, lithium-air batteries, even wind-energy kites.
One of the profiled technologies was a 3D printed battery. “The concept is to integrate form and function,” said Jennifer Lewis, Wyss Professor of Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University. “Our batteries 1000 times smaller than the smallest rechargeable Lithium Ion battery that you can find commercially.” They are so small, in fact, that each battery can fit on a grain of sand.
Now don’t get too excited yet. You can’t 3D print one of these batteries on your MakerBot, Lewis explained, “We’ve custom designed and built our own 3D printers as well as the inks that allow you print the anode and cathode in interdigitated fashion.”
Applications of these batteries include autonomous sensors, micro robots, and biomedical devices. For example, 98% of hearing aids are 3D printed, at least the plastic molding is. But you have to hand pot the electronics and replace the batteries every 7 days. With Lewis’ 3D printed micro battery technology, it’s possible to 3D print both the plastic and the electronics.
In the video below, 3D printing is used to deposit a specially formulated “ink” through a fine nozzle to build a microbattery’s anode layer by layer. Unlike an office inkjet printer that dispenses ink droplets onto paper, these inks are formulated to exit the nozzle like toothpaste from a tube and immediately harden into thin layers. The printed anode contains nanoparticles of a lithium metal oxide compound that provide the proper electrochemical properties.
You can learn more about this research at Harvard’s website and read the work published in the journal Advanced Materials.
