Chances are if you’re normal and sane and at least remotely responsible with your money, you’re not dropping $2,000 on a 3D printer. But that doesn’t mean you can’t tinker with 3D printing. eBay just released an app called Exact, that lets you customize and purchase your own items.
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Early leader in the 3D printing space Makerbot may have just been acquired for $400 million, but we still can’t forget about the Form 1 3D printer out of FormLabs.
It started as a Kickstarter project, which received 6x its $100,000 goal in just one day, topping $1.4 million in one week. Since, we’ve had the chance to review it and pit it against the Makerbot.
However, the two are quite different:
The Form 1 shines a laser onto a metal surface through a layer of resin. Using a process of photopolymerization, the slices are laid down one after the other creating a solid object that lifts out of the resin as it is built. Think of the Makerbot as a stalagmite maker — the material is laid down on a platform — while the Form 1 is a stalactite maker where the object hangs from the platform that slowly moves up.
They also have different price tags: The Makerbot Replicator 2 costs $2,199 where the Form 1 goes for $3,299. However, Biggs found that the Form 1′s resin-based approach offered much more precision and a higher resolution result.
Two flys.
Microsoft is adding native support for 3D printers to Windows 8.1. That means you don’t have to jump through any hoops to 3D print an item—if your computer is hooked up to a 3D printer, you can just hit print.
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Instagram now has video! It may or may not be better than Vines. Samsung showed off a bunch of computers and cameras and phones with strange names. That was fun. And of course, 3D printing sweetheart Makerbot sold for $400 million to Stratasys.
It’s been a long, crazy, eventful week, and we’re here to discuss it with you on the TechCrunch Gadgets Podcast, featuring John Biggs, Jordan Crook, Darrell Etherington, Chris Velazco, and a touch of Matt Burns.
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Intro Music by Rick Barr.
This afternoon, 3D printing giant Stratasys announced the $403 million acquisition of MakerBot. And while it won’t change anything about MakerBot’s brand, Stratasys could supply the know-how to scale up business in a big way. That could mean more stores, more factories, and even more offices.
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Stratasys, an Israeli-based 3D printer and additive manufacturer has just agreed to acquire 3D printing company MakerBot for a proposed amount of $403 million in stock. They’ve announced a “definitive merger agreement” where MakerBot would converge with a subsdiary of Stratasys in a stock-for-stock transaction. After selling more than 22,000 3D printers since its inception in 2009, MakerBot is seen as a leader and pioneer in the 3D printing space, and about 11,000 of those sales were due to the Replicator 2 alone. MakerBot will operate as a separate entity with its own branding and marketing as part of the deal, and will provide an affordable 3D printing market for Stratasys. If all goes well with the regulators, it should be done by the third quarter of 2013.
Granted, it’s not a 3D printer in every home, but it’s surely a step in the right direction. MakerBot announced today that its Replicator 2 will be joining Amazon’s new 3D Printer Store, a central location on the site for devices, accessories, books and the like. The store features a number of other devices from the competition, though MakerBot seems to be far and away the biggest name involved at the moment. Surely the days of printing up those Amazon orders can’t be too far off, right?
Filed under: Peripherals, Amazon
MakerBot is building an empire selling printers that make things—but have you ever wondered where the printers themselves are made? On June 7th, the company opened a huge new factory to accommodate the booming demand for Replicators, and we got a first-hand look inside.
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If you thought you and your RepRap were safe from posers, you’re sunk: Amazon has just opened a store for 3D printers and printer accessories that seems to, at the very least, allow smaller manufacturers to get a foothold in an increasingly tight market.
Available on the “pop up web store” or whatever you want to call it are printers from Afinia and Flashforge (which, as you’ll notice, is a literal rip-off of the Makerbot) as well as offers from Makerbot owners who are selling used machines. In short, the store consists of smaller fry attempting to sell directly to a less educated consumer – which is fine.
With Staples selling Cube 3D printers and Toys “R” Us selling personalized ducks in Hong Kong, it’s clear we’re reaching the point when 3D printing is beginning to interface with the culture. It’s still “cool” enough to be cutting edge yet it’s lucrative enough for behemoths like Amazon to throw it a bone with this store.
And what of the folks who want their 3D printers to be the hardware equivalent of underground prog rock? Well, we’re probably out of luck. I’ll know it’s gone mainstream when my Dad asks for one and, the way things are going, that should be some time next week.
Brooklyn-based MakerBot is a darling of the 3D printing community, and it recently moved into its new digs in Sunset Park, so the crew can more efficiently build and ship their shiny new Replicator 2 and 2X printers. Call it a classic case of growing pains — once demand for 3D printers started picking up, the MakerBot team soon found themselves aching for even more space to work in, and we got the chance to tour the new 50,000-square-foot facility when it opened last week.
All things considered, it’s a nifty operation, and the move should help MakerBot cope with growing prominence as the 3D printing movement slowly moves into the mainstream… especially as it attempts to make the printing process easier with its forthcoming desktop scanner. Of course, MakerBot’s position as a high-profile purveyor of 3D printing wares has reportedly made it an attractive target for a potential acquisition, with Minnesota/Israel-based Stratasys and even Amazon (which just recently opened a 3D printer section) being pegged as potential purchasers.
MakerBot’s ebullient founder Bre Pettis was keen to downplay that acquisition chatter, as he cut the ceremonial ribbon at the factory’s grand opening (using a partially 3D printed pair of scissors, naturally), but he did later note that they weren’t going anywhere. But while those conversations continue behind closed doors, the roughly 100 employees at MakerBot’s new Brooklyn outpost will continue assembling those printers by hand for a while to come — why not take a look and see what they’re up to?
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