News and Insights of 3D Printing and Manufacturing
Prototek Holdings LLC (“Prototek“), a leading North American provider of industrial 3D printing and other digital manufacturing services for low-volume production, completed the acquisition of ProtoCAM, a premier industrial 3D printing company located in Allentown, PA. ProtoCAM will merge into Midwest Prototyping, Prototek’s additive manufacturing arm acquired in July 2021.
Triditive, a Spanish-based company focused on the automation of additive manufacturing, has secured €5M in a pre-series A funding round. The capital injection was led by a notable Spanish industrial group.
The Boxing Hand Grenade, the creation of a UK-based personal trainer and martial arts instructor, John Docherty, was developed after sustaining a cumulative injury to his hand and wrist. The handheld device has been ergonomically designed to fit the contours of the hand and to be worn under traditional boxing hand wraps inside boxing gloves.
When General Motors was unable to produce a component needed for the delivery of the 2022 Chevrolet Tahoe, the company’s engineers turned to 3D printing, as many companies facing supply chain challenges are doing, increasingly.
Doctors in Dubai have successfully completed a series of surgeries on a young male patient to reform his facial deformities using 3D printed titanium implants.
Cults is a 3D model marketplace that connects designers to people wanting to make real-world objects through 3D printing. As not everyone has an artistic soul, or the ability to use CAO 3D software, Cults highlights the work of designers who wish to make 3D printing accessible to all. In addition to this, Cults is a social network that brings together fans of the 3D printer world – enabling them to interact with each other.
MachineWorks Ltd, a company that has been providing advanced 3D software engines to manufacturers and engineering software developers since 1994, has made available example source code supporting data transfer of 3MF files with Polygonica – MachineWorks’ unique Boolean engine that provides automatic mesh repair and offsetting capabilities.
As additive manufacturing continues to evolve, one question that is on many people’s minds is whether there is enough talent to sustain the industry’s growth. As a relatively new segment in the manufacturing world, AM has undeniably had challenges with skills gaps. Early on, the development of disruptive 3D printing processes outpaced AM training and education. Fortunately, AM processes and associated skills are now increasingly being integrated into many levels of education. To gain insights into the current state of the AM workforce and talent acquisition, we caught up with UK-based recruitment firm Kensington Additive.
Nasdaq First North-listed Freemelt, whose pioneering solutions create new conditions for rapid growth and development in 3D printing, has received an order, to a value close to $500k, for a Freemelt ONE system from the prestigious Georgia Institute of Technology in the US. The system will be used for materials research and will be delivered in the second quarter of 2022.
Visiting Sinterit, the leader in compact SLS 3D printers, is always fun. Cracow, where the company is based, is a beautiful city and even the recent global tensions can ruin the welcoming atmosphere. It had been two years since we last visited to test and review their Lisa Pro machine. Then COVID came, just as the company began moving into the new, much larger facility. In the meantime, Formlabs, the market leader in the affordable SLA segment and Sinterit’s most credible competitor in the compact SLS segment, launched its machine after almost four years of announcements. The Polish company, founded by ex-Google developers and led by CEO Maxime Polesello could have been overwhelmed. Instead, the entire management team decided to focus on new product development and training for its employees. The result is that now, two years later, Sinterit is settled in a large new facility, with a highly organized assembly line, one ambitious product, Lisa X, hitting the market and one more, perhaps even more ambitious, NILS, getting ready to do so soon. When the opportunity came to do another test, this time with the Lisa X, I jumped and I was not disappointed.