Tag Archives: peer-to-peer

Startup Launches Teleport It 3D to Revolutionize P2P 3D Printing

Teleport It 3D 3D Printing Layer by Layer

3D Printing Goes Peer-to-Peer with Teleport It 3D

Layer by Layer, a California-based 3D printing startup announced the availability of Teleport It 3D™, an online file-sharing platform that allows users to “teleport” ready-­to-­print designs to anyone with access to a personal 3D printer.

By emphasizing the final physical objects made by 3D printers, Teleport It 3D shifts the current 3D printing industry’s focus away from digital designs. While sharing 3D printable designs is typically complex and time-­consuming, the platform streamlines the process by pre-­slicing all teleported designs.

When sending a file, a user first uploads a design and adds any settings they have previously used to print the object. Senders may also limit the amount of time or number of prints their teleported design is available for. With the client-­side TelePad™ software application, users receive 3D printable designs without actually downloading or slicing any CAD files. Once a “teleport” expires, it disappears from the user’s TelePad account, leaving behind a newly 3D printed object.

The first platform of its kind, Teleport It 3D not only makes it easy to share 3D printable designs, it protects the work of designers. Secure Stream technology allows Layer By Layer to stream designs directly to 3D printers without compromising or giving away actual design files. The application of pre-­sliced, ready-­to-print file streaming makes using a personal 3D printer easier then ever while introducing a better, safer way to share designs.

We interviewed Max Friefeld, Founder & COO of Layer by Layer:

On 3D Printing: Tell us about the inspiration for this new site / business.

Friefeld: The founders of Layer By Layer believe that 3D printing will be the cause of the next industrial revolution. By increasing the availability of 3D printing related products and platforms, we can advance the future of the 3D printing industry and change the world. Part of this means that 3D printing must become more accessible, easier to use and understand.

Teleport It 3D was inspired by these core values. The platform takes a new approach to personal 3D printing by shifting the current focus away from digital designs and to the physical products people can make on their 3D printers.

What’s the advantage of using Teleport It 3D? Our platform allows users to send prints not files.  This way, a designer can share their work without giving anyone else access to the original design file. Their work is protected from improper distribution and alteration, and meanwhile, the receiver doesn’t have to worry about downloading any actual files to their computer or figuring out the proper settings. They can just print the product.

On 3D Printing: Who is Teleport It 3D targeted at? Upon first glance, it seems to be more advanced than, say, Shapeways. You have to know what an STL file is, for example.

Friefeld: We streamlined the process of teleporting as much as possible so that the platform would appeal to a larger audience. In order to send a file, you need basic knowledge of 3D printing files/settings, so we expect our senders [at first] to be mostly makers and other people with a general knowledge of 3D printing CAD designing. Our receivers  however, can be anyone with access to a 3D printer. We do all the work with the sent file, and so all the recipient needs is a way to print it out.

On 3D Printing: Is this the MegaUpload for 3D printing?

Friefeld: We do no store files like a MegaUpload, when someone sends a teleport ,it is only delivered to the single recipient.

On 3D Printing: How do I find a “friend who has a 3D printer?” Are you looking to expand to more of an eBay peer-to-peer model at some point?

Friefeld: I’m glad you asked. Stay tuned for the launch of our next platform, next month. Right now, in order to send a teleport, the sender must know the receiver, so for the moment, “a friend” actually means a friend.

 

Learn more at teleportit3d.com.

Cloud Production Coming: Does Every Consumer Need a 3D Printer?

Cloud Production 3D Printing

Consumer 3D printers are still costly. The latest models from MakerBot are over $1,700 and a DIY kit still costs $400 or more. Does every consumer need a 3D printer? Not according to Phin Barnes, venture capitalist with First Round Capital.

At AND 1 we had a 3D printer. It was super expensive but it shortened the time from a drawing to a physical object by weeks. The file that drove the printer could also drive the CNC machines in Asia that cut the aluminum molds we used for production.

MakerBot has innovated in the 3D printing space by making the printer cheaper and establishing a marketplace for the digital files that create the physical objects. But for the people who want high quality, durable parts with real utility, will it ever be possible to have a CNC machine in your house for metal objects or an injection mold set up for TPU parts? Maybe, but why can’t I pay Makerbot to make my file in hard plastic or metal? Wouldn’t enough people want this makerbot Prime service to support a CNC machine in Brooklyn? I bet they would – and as the peer-to-peer economy grows, cloud production should grow with it.

Barnes goes on to comment about the different ways that entrepreneurs can solve “logistics problems”.

  1. Marketplaces:  There is great value in coordinating buyers and sellers and removing friction in an existing transactable space. (eBay, Half.com, ETSY, CustomMade, ThreadFlip). This is traditional behavior at web scale.
  2. Collaborative Consumption: A technology platform that coordinates demand and balances it across distributed capital assets. These platforms unlock a previously latent pool of demand (usually with very efficient unit pricing) and help individual suppliers maximize the value of their assets and time with better utilization rates. (Uber, TaskRabbit)

Both types of companies are solving a logistics problem — removing coordination friction that used to make a transaction impossible — but as this granularity of supply takes hold, the rules of utilization rates and economies of scale will still hold in the world of physical assets. I think this will inspire a third group of companies with logistics at their core: Cloud Production.

In the transition from digital to physical (online to offline) platforms that enable full utilization/rapid amortization of wholly-owned capital assets over a greater base of creators should emerge. Today’s cloud services are maximizing utilization of the physical devices required to store and serve digital goods. Cloud services in the digital space have changed the math of the creator’s business. Instead of budgeting for a certain level of demand — and buying servers to safely cover that projected level of usage, companies/creators can make sure the unit economics work for each unit of demand and architect for infinite scale. Up front costs are dramatically decreased and more ideas come to market.

This same transition should occur around the physical production of goods where economies of scale are powerful. With cloud production niche products can meet global demand and achieve greater scale than ever before. The innovation will be in the coordination and technology required to aggregate individual creativity and produce increasingly specialized, niche products with higher production value and quality.

In summary, physical goods production — enabled by 3D printing — will follow the lead of software-as-a-service and cloud computing to provide goods-on-demand. We are already seeing this trend from 3D printing marketplaces like Shapeways, i.materialise, and Ponoko.

 

Read the full post at Sneakerhead VC.

Cloud photo by Bast Productions used under Creative Commons license.