While many of us—this author included—may have to walk back claims that almost every home will own a 3D printer by the end of the decade, the low-cost 3D printer industry is continuing to grow and evolve. According to SmarTech Publishing, the new generation of low-cost 3D printers is even capable enough to perform work typically carried out by industrial machines. The report, titled “Opportunities in Low-Cost 3D Printers: Technologies, Materials and Markets - 2016,” explores trends surrounding low-cost 3D printing technology with results supporting the idea that low-cost machines are filling a specific market niche with increasingly robust technology.
Though the market research firm records 92 percent of low-cost systems as thermoplastic extrusion 3D printers, low-cost photopolymerization printers grew at a rate of 116 percent in 2015. Photopolymerization printers like the Ember from Autodesk, the XFAB from DWS, and the Form 2 from Formlabs are also thought of as industrial grade, while maintaining price points that float around the $5,000 mark. Engineering-grade materials developed in partnership with large chemical companies, such as Eastman and DuPont, also demonstrate the expanded capabilities of thermoplastic extrusion systems.
New technologies are being developed that further expand the low-cost 3D printer segment. The Mcor ARKe, for instance, 3D prints full-color models from paper and has a price of about $9,000, while the Mark Two fiber composite 3D printer has a price of around $5,500 and the Voxel8 electronics 3D printer is sold in packages that start at $8,999. The $3,500 Squink from BotFactory fits nicely into this segment as well, and is capable of printing multilayered circuits.
Some of these machines may not be as capable as industrial machines—though some, like the Mark Two, don’t have industrial equivalents—but serve a niche market. They are capable of performing low- to medium-level prototyping for small- and medium-sized companies. As not every engineer may want to go out and purchase one of these machines, SmarTech suggests that there may be room for business-to-consumer (B2C) services to step in and 3D print items for them. Meanwhile, the cost of other 3D printing technologies, such as selective laser sintering and binder jetting, are slowly starting to drop, indicating that, in the not-so-distant future, we may even be treated to an influx of new low-cost systems utilizing other desirable 3D printing processes.
All these dynamics may soon live through a significant acceleration with the official market entrance by HP and the IT’s giant stated intention to make 3D printing a strategic priority. Its ultrafast Multi Jet Fusion (MJF) technology is affordable, highly scalable and—together with its open materials policy—may fuel a significant push in product, process and materials innovation. Its effect on the low-cost 3D printing market is not clear at this point, but it is going to be closely monitored and will certainly be seen in SmarTech’s future reports.