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On my recent trip to Israel, I had the pleasure of visiting the headquarters of metal and ceramics 3D printing provider XJet in Rehovot Science Park. My visit came about two weeks after the company announced the installation of its first commercial metal 3D printer, the Carmel 1400M, with a customer, specifically AM firm Azoth3D, so it was an exciting time.
But soon after I arrived, I learned that things were even more exciting than I’d originally thought. I had the surprise opportunity to meet Yair Alcobi, who is taking the reins at XJet as the new CEO, as the company announced just this morning. Founder and current CEO Hanan Gothait will move into the position of President. As he told me that day, this means “the company is gearing up to the next stage of life…fully commercialized, fully industrialized.”
Carmel 1400. Image courtesy of XJet.
“We developed a unique technology that’s totally different than what exists for 3D manufacturing of metal and ceramics,” Gothait told me. “It’s not binder jet. It’s not laser sintering. We’re the only one in the world that’s jetting the material and the support material.”
He reminded me that XJet’s systems are user-friendly, with no powder or waste, and offer “straightforward part production” at 10 micron accuracy. That’s why the company believes it will be “a serious player in the manufacturing segment” for high-value parts with complex geometries and high resolution. Gothait, who’s been the CEO since 2014, said XJet has invested a lot of money in developing its unique NanoParticle Jetting (NPJ) technology. Part of his journey involved “bringing the company to where it is now,” with many good ceramics customers and now its first metal customer.
Hanan Gothait, Founder of XJet. Image courtesy of XJet.
He explained that, at the beginning, XJet was involved with a lot of R&D and development efforts, finding customers for beta testing, and introducing its technology and products to the market. But now, the company is preparing to ramp up sales and production over the next several years and work to achieve mass commercialization. Gothait said he told the company’s Board of Directors that XJet would need a strong CEO to properly execute this next phase, and they all accepted the idea.
“Luckily we met Yair at the same time, who was considering leaving his current job,” Gothait told me. “I’m personally excited to see the company, led by Yair, become a major player with major revenues for the coming years.”
Alcobi was most recently the President of the PCB Division of KLA, which works in the semiconductor industry. Previously, he was President of Orbotech East Asia Subsidiary, a KLA Company. Alcobi has spent the last four years “running a big division of seven product families” with various multidisciplinary offerings, including inkjet printing and lithography. He’d decided it was time to consider moving on. “When I met Hanan and the team, I realized there was some very unique technology here.”
“I think for many years XJet was looking for the right combination to make the perfect product offering,” Alcobi told me. “This is the exact time where the product is in the right position to drive the adoption of the market segments.”
According to XJet’s press release, Alcobi has plenty of experience in successfully growing profits and revenues, and he confirmed this during our chat, explaining that he’s been through “similar processes with other technology.” He said that they “reached a tipping point where everything exploded, and I hope we can reach that quickly here.”
“Hanan created the industry, and we have the perfect talent here, so I’m optimistic,” Alcabi told me.
Yair Alcobi takes the position of XJet CEO starting May 1st. Image courtesy of XJet.
Alcobi said that, at KLA, he was responsible for 1,000 employees, 500 of whom lived in Asia, and ran a variety of product categories, such as inspection and optics—”very multidisciplinary.” While there, he ran all the business channels, supporting functions, R&D, sales and marketing, customer service, and more for these categories, and spent plenty of time “working with major players in Asia, especially in ceramics.” Alcobi mentioned that Japan is a huge market with plenty of technology, and that the country is filled with early adopters of new technology, so I asked if a focus on Asia would be one of his first major priorities as CEO of XJet. However, he said that his main focus would be on the “established market” in the U.S., and that he would work to understand that more first.
“It’s too early for me to declare anything, but from the overall perspective, the U.S. market is an extremely important one,” he told me.
Gothait confirmed that the U.S. will “likely remain the most important market.” Alcobi agreed, saying that “at the end of the day, the U.S. is bringing back lots of manufacturing capabilities, and additive manufacturing will obviously be key in that role,” so he believes the market here will continue to grow.
While they couldn’t share any names, Alcobi and Gothait told me that XJet has some pretty exciting customers lined up, and is in discussion with a few other big names as well. Additionally, the company has a lot of installations coming, some of which are repeated orders, which is obviously very positive news. So I’ll have to keep my ear to the ground.
With Alcobi firmly settled at the steering wheel during this important time for XJet, he’ll receive support from Avi Cohen, who joined XJet as Executive Chairman of the Board last year.
“It has been a comprehensive process to search for a new CEO for XJet. We interviewed and considered many candidates before making our decision,” Cohen said in the press release. “Yair's record in scaling businesses is enviable and exactly the right fit for taking XJet to the next level. We have exciting times ahead and I am sure that Yair has what it takes to make XJet successful. I look forward to working closely with Yair.”
Orit Tesler Levy joined XJet as CFO in April. Image courtesy of XJet.
XJet also announced the appointment of Orit Tesler Levy as the company’s CFO to round out an already strong management team. Most recently the Finance Director at Emerson, Tesler Levy has plenty of industry experience, as she was previously VP Finance FP&A Business Partnering at Stratasys, and held multiple positions Applied Materials in Israel and Silicon Systems Segment in California.
Before I met with Gothait and Alcobi, I first sat down with Haim Levi, VP Strategic Marketing, who’s been been involved with additive manufacturing “since the beginning.” He was one of the founders of Cubital, which he told me was one of the first companies to invent 3D printers. He was also with Objet from its formation until it merged with Stratasys, where he spent nearly a decade as Region Manager North Central Europe. Levi gave me an excellent refresher on XJet, which holds more than 80 patents, and its NPJ technology.
NanoParticle Jetting is based on nanoparticles suspended in a liquid dispersion, and it’s important to note that this material jetting process is not binder jetting. Droplets are jetted, and once they touch the hot build plate, the liquid evaporates, leaving behind the material to build a part. NPJ can print two materials at the same time in this powderless process.
Weighing in at 3 tons, the Carmel 1400 offers high rate jetting with 24 heads, 512 nozzles, and 18,000 droplets jetted per second in thin layers. The system also has two build trays, each one measuring 500 mm x 140 mm, so the amount of parts that can be printed in one job is pretty impressive. Levi told me that parts fabricated using NPJ have excellent part properties, including high density, low shrinkage, and isotropy. He said that the process itself is short and simple, offering design freedom to create near net shape parts with complex geometries, smooth surface, and fine details.
We were then joined by Marketing Manager Alon Ziv and Dr. Ophira Melamed, Customer Success Director and, as Levi told me, responsible for the company’s Additive Manufacturing Centre (AMC), which opened its doors in 2018. I got a tour of the AMC, which is where all aspects of the company’s NPJ process—including software, hardware, QA, measurement and more—are tested. The AMC includes an Application Center and an R&D lab for chemistry, materials development, and testing the company’s water-based SMART station for automated support removal. A Carmel 1400 tray fits easily inside, and the SMART station can drain 45 liters of water a minute, heat five liters a minute in 30°C, and features a 250 or 500 L/H flow rate system for reverse osmosis.
I learned that Carmel 1400 systems with a silver stripe in the middle print ceramics, including alumina, zirconia, and other technical ceramics with superior chemical, thermal, mechanical, and electrical properties, while the printers with bronze in the middle are for printing metals, such as tool steels and stainless steels.
While in the AMC, I had the opportunity to see and photograph some impressive prototype parts in the lab. Equally impressive were the real 3D printed parts, of which I obviously could not take pictures as they were either still in development or proprietary.
Levi told me that XJet is installing machines “all over,” including in Asia and Europe. The installations are still mostly ceramic systems, but the company is currently in the final stages of agreements for its metal systems, several of which should be installed by the end of the year. The company does have service people in the US right now, and as it is such an important market, as Alcobi and Gothait said, XJet is working to set up business representation there as well. The company is also working on something pretty exciting that isn’t yet public because it’s still in development, but could have major applications for medical implants in the future.
I had a very enjoyable and insightful visit to XJet, and I’m excited to see how the company continues to progress under Alcobi. Below are a few more pictures, enjoy:
XJet has announced that founder Hanan Gothait will step away from his role as CEO to become President, with Yair Alcobi replacing him at the head of the company.
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Essentium's High Speed Extrusion (HSE) 3D printing technology has been used to prototype and manufacture ten Worlds Protect COVID-19 breathalyser kiosks.
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In collaboration with education partner The CREATE Education Project, TCT Inspired Minds works to provide high school students access to a variety of technologies and training relating to additive manufacturing (AM).
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Fortify has secured a strategic investment agreement with In-Q-Tel, Inc. (IQT), a not-for-profit strategic investor that aims to accelerate technology developments in support of US intelligence and defence agencies.
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Before investors pulled the rug out from mergers with special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs), 2021 was a record-breaking year as 604 blank-check deals raised $144 billion. The timing was crucial for 3D printing businesses, with many of them finding ideal opportunities to merge with publicly traded shell corporations to go public. Among them was Essentium. Had the deal been finalized, the Texas-based industrial 3D printing solutions provider would have seen its valuation reach close to $1 billion.
Just like dozens of other companies, Essentium's deal went sour as the market deteriorated in the back half of 2021. Essentium and the SPAC company, Atlantic Coastal Acquisition Corp. (NASDAQ: ACAH), decided to terminate the deal, and the startup's plans for rapid expansion stalled. As a result, Essentium lost another deal. This time with Collider, a startup that officially came out of stealth mode in 2016 with its hybrid Programmable Tooling technology and Orchid 3D printer.
Fortify, manufacturer of the FLUX series of composite digital light processing (DLP) printers, just made two big announcements that bode well for the company's future. First off, Fortify will be making commercially available a range of materials that it has developed specifically designed for the additive manufacturing (AM) of electronics devices. Additionally, the company has entered into a strategic investment agreement with In-Q-Tel, a principal venture capital vehicle of the U.S. intelligence community.
The two announcements are not unrelated, as Fortify's partnership with In-Q-Tel will also involve the development of materials and production processes related to radio frequency (RF) devices and wireless tech. In particular, the materials of interest will be those optimized for two Industry 4.0 areas: 5G infrastructure and the industrial internet of things (IOT). Beyond those two sectors, although certainly also overlapping with them, the two companies will be exploring applications of the materials for the aerospace and automotive industries.
In a Fortify press release announcing both the new materials as well as the new partnership, Victoria Chernow, Technology Architect at In-Q-Tel, said, "The manufacture of complex, tailor-made components are essential for our partners — the U.S. intelligence and defense communities. This is where 3D printing offers enormous potential and value. Fortify's materials and 3D printing capabilities hold great value in delivering flexible, real-time tools to meet their mission needs."
Fortify uses the term "Continuous Kinetic Mixing" (CKM) for its proprietary DLP printing technique. The main problem that Fortify's technology addresses is sedimentation and aggregation of the resin in parts during the print process, a typical issue faced by users of 3D printers with loaded resins (resins mixed with reinforcement materials). With CKM, the materials are, well, mixed continuously, preventing this problem.
One major advantage of this is that it allows the company's printers to work with more viscous materials than is the case with most DLP machines. This is reflected in a recent low-loss dielectric resin developed in partnership with Rogers Corporation, soon to be a subsidiary of DuPont. The material has applications in the development of unique antennas with complex geometries.
As mentioned above, one major objective of the partnership — and In-Q-Tel's funding — is to scale up and further develop materials optimized for 3D printing devices reliant on 5G and the industrial IOT. Most specifically, this means the new capabilities for sensing systems made possible by 5G. The materials that Fortify has already developed are all designed to meet the standards necessary for many types of popularly-available electronics devices.
By partnering with In-Q-Tel, Fortify will be facilitating the bespoke replication, research into, and adaptation of those same types of devices for America's spies and soldiers. The materials and designs enabled by CKM may, among other things, enable greater potential for device encryption and cybersecurity. And also, of course, today's military hardware is tomorrow's consumer tech.
It's not clear how much In-Q-Tel is investing in Fortify, but in a recent round of funding about a year ago, Fortify gained 20 million dollars in investments. It's doubtful In-Q-Tel invested anywhere close to that amount, but, given In-Q-Tel's track record, it does strongly suggest that that $20 million has been well-spent thus far — and that Fortify will probably succeed at its goal of scaling up.
RAPD+TCT 2022 is just around the corner and among the attendees is Arburg is ready to show off advances made to its Arburg Plastic Freeforming (APF) technology. At the event, the German leader in injection molding and 3D printing technology, will be displaying a standard Freeformer 300-3X alongside a specialty version of the system capable of processing high-temperature materials. Additionally, the company will be presenting its ProcessLog app, for tracking and documenting 3D printing jobs in detail.
The Advantages of APF
APF is distinguished using a piezoelectric screw to deposit individual droplets of polymer material at rates of up to 200 droplets per second with diameters of 0.2 and 0.4mm. Because commercially accessible pellets are employed, the approach is amenable to a far broader range of materials that manufacturers are likely already familiar with and might be used for mass manufacturing. Because filaments are much more expensive than injection molding pellets, this dramatically cuts part costs.
At RAPID + TCT in Detroit, two Freeformer 300-3X machines will additively manufacture sophisticated functional parts. Image courtesy of Arburg.
Arburg has begun expanding both its presence in additive manufacturing (AM) and in North America. With the acquisition of German RepRap, it gained a series of industrial fused filament fabrication machines, as well as silicone deposition technology. Through a partnership with Würth Additive, it began distributing its products in North America.
High-Temperature 3D Printing
The firm's attendance at North America's largest AM trade show furthers Arburg's marketing efforts in the region. In particular, the company will be showcasing the ability of the Freeformer 300-3X to reach 200° Celsius, allowing it to process high temperature materials, such as ULTEM and PEEK. ULTEM 9085, for instance, is a permanently flame-retardant, low-smoke material approved for aerospace applications. The Freeformer 300-3X can also 3D print biocompatible, resorbable, sterilizable and FDA-approved original materials.
A high-temperature Freeformer 300-3X can process PEE, into such items as individualized skull implants, including support material. Image courtesy of Arburg.
The system features optimized temperature management, including cooling necessary for proper printing. This is particularly important for the axis drives, ensuring the precise positioning of the print along the x, y and z axes. Altogether, the Freeformer is capable of printing parts that achieve 95 percent strength in the X- and Y-axes.
Moreover, the printer can be made suitable for clean room applications with only some minor tweaks. This makes it possible to 3D print implantable and biocompatible parts. At RAPID + TCT, the Freeformer will showcase these possibilities by processing a medically approved PEEK granulate.
Process Monitoring
Additionally, Arburg will present its ProcessLog app, which captures process and build job data and displays it in a clear, visual manner. This information is documented and traced on a per-part basis. The data can be viewed over the course of an entire build, including granular information related to material pressure, screw position, droplet frequency and discharge rate. By reliably documenting the printing process and production of each part, manufacturers can ensure traceability for products in safety-relevant applications. Additionally, multiple Freeformer machines can be networked together using an Industrial Internet of Things tool, such as the “arburgXworld” customer portal.
All Freeformers can be networked with the “arburgXworld” customer portal. The specially developed “ProcessLog” app allows a wide range of process and build job data for APF parts to be displayed in clear graphical form, documented, and traced on a part-specific basis. Image courtesy of Arburg.
Arburg at RAPID + TCT
Outside of high-temperature materials and the ProcessLog app, Arburg will demonstrate flexible materials, polypropylene parts, and hard and soft combinations at RAPID + TCT. Thanks to post-processing partner OTEC, the company will also showcase 3D printed parts with surface quality that match those made with injection molding through the use of vibratory finishing and barrel tumbling.
Arburg suggests that the North American market will benefit from access to local and remote service, process monitoring, as well support for customer orders and processing customer-specific materials. As the German company is already well-established in the industrial manufacturing space, it suggests that it applies its expertise across the entire value chain, in turn, ensuring industrial quality in AM from the start. To learn more, visit the Arburg website or see APF in person at Booth #2108 at RAPID + TCT.
Fashion is one of the world’s most polluted industries, as Ronen Samuel, CEO of Kornit Digital (NASDAQ: KRNT), said at Kornit Fashion Week Tel Aviv 2022. I was lucky enough to be at the event in Israel when he said this, as I was invited by Kornit, alongside investors, partners, customers, and other journalists when the company unveiled its Kornit Atlas MAX Poly and Kornit Apollo solutions for digital, sustainable fashion. The theme of the whirlwind week was “Witness the Future.” I really felt like I was, as the focus was on changing the fashion and textiles industry to produce far less waste, while still maintaining flexibility to celebrate one’s own identity.
A little background: Kornit specializes in on-demand textile production, and its 3D-related technology, called direct-to-garment (DTG) printing, basically applies digital printing to textiles. Kornit systems use inkjet printheads to deposit color onto fabric, starting with white ink to achieve full color on dark garments. The company’s MAX technology, and its XDi feature, deposits 3D layers, and embeds 3D objects, onto fabrics. It looks a lot like embroidery or screen printing, but it’s a single additive process. Kornit also offers a single-step, direct-to-fabric (DTF) printing solution for textiles as well, and both are meant to be more sustainable.
In 2020, Kornit acquired cloud-based software workflow solutions provider Custom Gateway. Last year, 3DPrint.com’s Editor in Chief Michael Molitch-Hou noted that the closest competing technology to Kornit’s XDi was by Voxel8. Just a few months later, Kornit purchased Voxel8, nipping that problem in the bud. This winter, the company acquired Tesoma, which specializes in textile drying and curing machinery that now drives the new Kornit Apollo. As Robert Zoch, Global Content Manager at Kornit Digital, told event attendees, the hardware acquisitions make its technology possible, while the software acquisitions make it accessible.
These acquisitions helped Kornit achieve strong system sales and a record $87.5 million revenue for the fourth quarter of 2021. So, the company entered 2022 with a very strong backlog and even more visibility, putting it in a great position ahead of its exciting announcements.
Before we got to see Kornit’s latest technology for ourselves, we saw the results in two exciting fashion shows at Hangar 11, an entertainment and event venue in the port of Tel Aviv. Fashion Week was already in full swing by the time my group got on the scene. Our arrival was timed to see two fashion collections that were, as Samuel told the crowd, “based 100% on Kornit’s technology,” specifically the Kornit Presto MAX, and made in Israel by one of the company’s partners.
First up was Israeli fashion designer Sigal Dekel with a beautiful collection of clothing that actually looked wearable. The color palette was muted but lovely, with blues, grays, and tans, and frequent pops of pink. I also appreciated that the runway show featured a diverse array of models; we learned later that one of the women was in her 70s!
A brief cocktail hour was followed by a runway show by Yanky & Nataf, two fashion designers who also happen to be married.
This collection was the polar opposite of the first, with bright, shiny colors galore. There were literal disco balls on the runway, and the show opened with a performance by a talented Israeli singer, who stayed to sing on the runway while the models strutted around him.
The whole time, I felt like I was on an episode of Project Runway, and I loved it. Our shuttle buses then came and whisked us all away to the non-profit Peres Center for Peace & Innovation, another one of Kornit’s new partners. In addition to enjoying dinner, drinks, and conversation, we were all given a tour of the center, which develops and implements unique programs and celebrates the many innovations born in Israel—including Kornit’s sustainable fashion technology.
The Peres Center for Peace and Innovation
The next morning, we went to Kornit headquarters in Rosh HaAyin, where about 500 employees work. When we arrived, we had the chance to grab some coffee and breakfast before sitting down for a morning of presentations and demonstrations.
“While the fashion industry is really fun, it's also really harmful,” Samuel said, after a brief video on the true ecological cost of manufacturing clothing.
Samuel, who was wearing a jacket with white ink produced on Kornit’s Presto Max printer, went on to say that, for every screen printed shirt today, thousands more are made in the same batch. But many of those thousands of shirts aren’t worn, and end up as yet another waste product. These large quantities are produced to address next season’s consumers, which makes absolutely no sense from a sustainability perspective, but is unfortunately how the fashion industry has been run for many years. Samuel also noted that 28 trillion liters of water are used to produce shirts, and 40% of produced clothing goes to the landfill.
“We developed technology to print textiles more sustainably, which puts quality and efficiency before mass quantity,” Samuel said.
The supply chain is also “really broken.” We all remember what happened in the Suez Canal last year, and, unfortunately, this will continue to be an issue. As a result, there’s been a shift to more onshore and nearshore production, which is causing the behavior of brands and retailers to change. But it’s not just because ships can’t get from Point A to Point B. The larger reason is that people are moving more towards the digital world. While we used to consume fashion through magazines (I remember how excited I was in middle school for my dELiA*s catalogue to arrive), today we watch influencers on social media, and rely more on e-commerce.
Samuel said the virtual experience in fashion will also influence this evolution, as people will likely buy more clothes online. He also suggested that Kornit’s “on-demand sustainable proximity production” is the way to “connect the virtual to the physical.”
The idea is that, if you’re shopping for clothing online, you can get any color or type of image without having to manufacture thousands of the same item. There’s no inventory sitting around taking up space. Once an order is placed, it’s routed to a fulfiller close to the consumer. In this way, garments can be customized and personalized, but with equal amounts of consistency and quality.
CEO Ronen Samuel demonstrates augmented reality with an iPad.
Another way to connect the physical world to the virtual one is with augmented reality. Using an iPad, Samuel showed us how an employee’s Kornit-made shirt, featuring David Bowie and a QR code, could be scanned and take you to a virtual experience, like a video of Bowie performing.
It often takes over 18 months to launch fashion collections. However, Samuel said the two collections we’d seen the day before were created and launched in just one month with Kornit’s technology. The company has held fashion shows in Milan and Los Angeles, and will soon host another in London, “to show people that they can unleash their creativity in a sustainable way.”
Kornit is focusing on the production floor, connecting the virtual and physical worlds through KornitX business solutions, automation, and the virtual world itself, i.e., working with NFTs. Customer testing has already begun for the automated Apollo system, which was designed for mass customized production and should be available next year. Kornit has 1,300 customers around the world that could benefit from the platform, which Samuel said can produce 400 black t-shirts with white ink in one hour, “the highest productivity available today in the digital world.”
He also described KornitX, which goes from “pixel to parcel” to connect the demand to the supply. According to the website, KornitX helps brands, fulfillers, and licensors move to on-demand fashion by providing the tools with which to generate more revenue and update the supply chain.
Kornit hopes to become the operating system of the fashion industry for sustainable, on-demand production. The company also recently released its impact report, and promised that, by 2026, it will save 4.3 trillion liters of water. Finally, Kornit wants to bring diversity and inclusivity to the runway and send a message that “beautiful is not one-size-fits-all.”
Stay tuned for more about my visit to Israel…until then, take a look at some more of my pictures from Kornit Fashion Week Tel Aviv 2022 below:
After years in the making, biotech research firm Satellite Bio emerged from stealth mode last week with more than $110 million in financing to pioneer an entirely new category of regenerative medicine called tissue therapeutics and announced former Novartis executive Dave Lennon as CEO.
Co-founded in 2019 by MIT Wilson Professor of Engineering Sangeeta Bhatia and Boston University William Fairfield Warren Professor of Biomedical Engineering Christopher Chen, Satellite Bio aims to restore organ function and provide treatment solutions for progressive and elusive diseases.
The company explains that through its exclusive Satellite Adaptive Tissue (SAT) platform, it can turn virtually any cell type into bioengineered tissues integrated into the body to restore natural function. These implantable therapy tissues, called Satellites, can deliver the comprehensive cellular response, in vivo, needed to repair or even replace critical organ functions in patients with diseases caused by genetic and environmental factors. Furthermore, Satellites can overcome many of the challenges that have hindered prior attempts to restore organ function and change the course of progressive and difficult-to-treat diseases.
"Tissue therapeutics replace organ and tissue systems that break down during disease progression. This next frontier of regenerative medicine has enormous potential to provide solutions for some of the most elusive diseases," said Lennon, who holds a Ph.D. in molecular medicine from Cornell University and was President of Novartis' Gene Therapies, where he launched the groundbreaking regenerative medicine Zolgensma®, gene therapy for spinal muscular atrophy.
Virtually any type of cell across many clinical applications can be used with the SAT platform, including primary, induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC)-derived, or engineered cells. This can drive a pipeline of sophisticated cell-based therapeutic solutions across a broad range of clinical applications to tackle elusive diseases in patients.
Initial efforts will be focused on liver cells, which secrete proteins to clear toxins from the bloodstream. This is no coincidence, considering that Bhatia's research began at MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital when she started to work on finding a way to keep liver cells alive outside the body so that they could be used to filter the blood of patients with liver disease. Even though that was twenty years ago, she was focused on creating a "microliver" technology that was very successful and is currently used by over 40 biotech and pharmaceutical companies worldwide to test their drugs for liver toxicity before they enter clinical trials.
Later, with Chen and fellow researchers, Bhatia began developing "satellite livers," which consisted of liver cells on a specially patterned matrix of blood vessels and transplanted them into their disease model. Once the scientists realized that "satellite livers" could improve outcomes for patients suffering from liver disease, establishing Satellite Bio was the obvious next step.
Today, the startup has an exclusive license to the unprecedented technology originating in the labs of Bhatia and Chen, and the duo also shares co-founding credit with Arnav Chhabra, an MIT PostDoctoral Fellow and head of the Satellite Bio Platform research and development group.
The bioprinting startup is the culmination of decades-long work by the founding duo, who began research into the technology, biology, and engineering of tissue therapeutics in the early 2000s. Building on the work of Dr. Robert Langer (founder of tissue engineering in regenerative medicine) and others, they combined more than two decades of collaborative research in tissue technology, biology, and bioengineering to create this new class of regenerative medicine called tissue therapeutics.
Throughout this time, they have also been heavily involved in bioprinting research, even becoming part of the Wyss Institute's 3D Organ Engineering initiative, where they work closely with microscale 3D printing pioneer Jennifer Lewis to bring "the know-how about how to go in vivo with engineered organs" and ultimately grow tissues that are large enough to help patients.
Satellite Bio Co-founders Sangeeta Bhatia and Christopher Chen, and CEO Dave Lennon. Images courtesy of Satellite Bio.
Before coming out of stealth mode, Satellite Bio raised $110 million in previously undisclosed Seed and Series A funding. The recent Series A round, which concluded on March 2022, was led by aMoon Growth and included prior seed-stage co-lead investors Lightspeed Venture Partners, aMoon Velocity, Polaris Partners, and Polaris Innovation Fund. In addition, new Series A investors included Section 32, Catalio Capital Management, and Waterman Ventures. The funds will support the development of the bioengineered tissues to repair, restore or replace a critical organ or tissue function, as Satellite Bio ultimately sets out to incorporate tissue therapeutics at point-of-care in the clinic.
Knowledgeable and experienced 3D printing operations people are in short supply. There were very few sites doing any kind of 3D printing at scale ten years ago. People well-versed in machine operations, management of printers, or manufacturing to specifications are rare and prized. To let the market grow, we need more people.
ASTM International is taking a step to help by offering the ¨Powder Bed Fusion – Laser Beam (PBF-LB) Machine Operator Certification program.” Pursuant to its ISO/ASTM 52942:2020 standard for qualifying LPBF machines, ASTM now offers theory and practical tests leading to the certification. Participants go through the Additive Manufacturing Procedure Specification (lists of relevant variables that should be controlled), standard operating procedures, machine management and build process monitoring, post processing, maintenance and materials. The program was codeveloped with EOS and is based on its M290 metal LPBF system.
Image courtesy of EOS.
"To successfully leverage AM technologies, we must pair those who are trained, and ASTM certified, for effective, efficient, and competent machine operations. EOS is proud to serve as the first AM equipment manufacturer to offer this personnel certification program. With ASTM, we are beginning to fill the need starting with the EOS M 290, but plan to expand certifications to cover all our metal and polymer platforms, and all material families,” said Dr. Gregory Hayes, Senior Vice President, Applied Technology at EOS North America.
Of course, it’s nice to be the standard and, in entry level systems, EOS has been the de facto standard, especially in North America for years now. It’s obvious that the firm wishes to leverage this effort into further trainings based on other systems, where EOS dominance is not so assured.
"Certification programs reinforce the use of standards and build trust and confidence in the use of AM technologies. This program is one of the first steps to fulfilling industry personnel certification needs and we look forward to quickly expanding to other machine vendor platforms. Together with key industry stakeholders, we can support reliable and competent use of the technology,” Mohsen Seifi, Ph.D., ASTM International's director of global additive manufacturing programs, stated.
Certification and qualification is crucial to the further growth of our industry. Certifying operators, standards, quality management and the like, will make or break efforts in actual manufacturing. We are still going from lab to fab and a lot of clipboards and paperwork will be what will get us there.
There are some excellent trainings for 3D printing, such as John Hart’s MIT course on Additive Manufacturing and the classes from Purdue and Barnes. However, there are few courses worldwide and there should be much more on offer. Often universities offer little in the way of actual practical 3D printing instruction, let alone operational competence. Many languages don’t have a definitive 3D printing certification or courses, for example. So we need a lot more in a much broader variety of formats and at different price points.
There should be standard courses available for all levels and all types of machines. Safety and management courses for operating 3D printers in medical facilities, fire safety for powders and powder machines, safety for schools should all be available worldwide. Hopefully, ASTM´s reach and considerable efforts in 3D printing will go far into making a widely accepted certification available globally.
DIMECC Ltd. is a Finnish organization dedicated to R&D founded in 2008 and is owned by almost 70 academic and industrial entities. Think of it as a Finnish version of Fraunhofer, the renowned and gargantuan German research institute. The group has now launched a project to establish a “comprehensive and open" database of metals used in additive manufacturing (AM) for Finnish industry
Since 2016, DIMECC ("Digital, Internet, Materials & Engineering Co-Creation") has had a particular interest in the digitalization of Finnish industry, along with the creation of new businesses focused on furthering that same purpose. Through its 3D printing contingent, Finnish Additive Manufacturing Ecosystem (FAME), the organization is pursuing further digitization, in a project dubbed the “Database for Radically Enhancing Additive Manufacturing and Standardization.” Or, to throw one more acronym at you: “DREAMS.”
DREAMS will accomplish this by printing 10,000 test rods composed of different metals and alloys, using different types of metal AM printers and production processes. Additionally, the project will also study "the utilization of 3D printing of metals in the most demanding applications."
The project's funding, totaling €6 million, came from Business Finland, a Finnish government investment agency, as well as the organizations involved. The latter include eight of the companies associated with FAME, as well as three Finnish universities. They hope to be done with the project by 2024. Concerning the role of the database in Finland's economic trajectory over the next several years, director of FAME Markus Korpela said, "With the help of extensive implementations of DREAMS, we will raise Finnish know-how to international awareness. For Finland, the development of domestic 3D printing is important so that the industry can be more export-oriented in the future."
Although it has a population of only about 5.5 million people, Finland is something of a tech hub. Investment in startups in the Scandinavian nation was at its highest levels ever in 2020 and 2021, with much of the capital coming from foreign investors. In turn, progress made by FAME could likely have global implications. Finland's robotics industry slipped from top 10 in the world in the middle of the last decade to no longer in the top 20 by the end of the the 2010s. However, the significantly increased investments in the country's tech sector the past couple years — which includes a project announced by Amazon in 2021, to develop autonomous delivery vehicles in Helsinki — suggest that Finland could once again become a global capital of automation.
The connection here is that the building of a database of materials is exactly the sort of thing required for optimizing automation in an AM-centered ecosystem. If DREAMS is a success, Finnish industry will be in good position to become a leader in the next generation of automated production of metal parts. Moreover, as I mentioned before, Finland's research could also reverberate in the global metal AM market. Automating the production of metal parts would seem to be one of the linchpins for tempering the volatility of global supply chains, and a comprehensive materials database is a necessary prerequisite for making future strides in automation of that sector.
Seiko Epson Corporation (TSE: 6724, "Epson") makes everything from watch movements to desktop printers. Given its precision and printing expertise it has long been speculated that the company would enter the 3D printing market. It did so last month, with an industrial extrusion system. Now it has, it is moving further into the space. Epson subsidiary Atmix, which makes artificial quartz and metal injection molding (MIM) parts, will produce powder for MIM and 3D printing.
Atmix is building a factory to manufacture its own powder, recycling Epson metals and the scrap of its partners. The logic behind this is not only commercial but based on the desire of Epson Group to be “underground resource free by 2050.” Epson suggests that it will not mine for any virgin nonrenewable materials by that time. This is seen as an environmentally advantageous move that also reduces the risk of the group to higher prices in the future.
The plant will take in metal powder products that are out of spec, as well as waste from its factory, used molds, dies, and metal scrap from Epson and its partners. Within three years of the factory’s operations, the company expects recycled metal to represent 25 percent of the total raw metal needs of Atmix.
To produce the powders, the company uses water atomization and a unique Spinning Water Atomization Process (SWAP) that can make amorphous metals and amorphous magnetic powders. With SWAP, a molten metal is broken up with high pressure gas and then quickly cooled.
On the polymer side, Epson is creating new IP by fundamentally improving extrusion processes. By coordinating extrusion speed through a valve and depositing material at a controlled temperature and in a highly precise way, the company aims for better layer adhesion and part strength. By making it open to a broad portfolio of materials, this technology could be of use in many areas while maintaining a low cost.
It seems that Epson is inching its way towards the 3D printer market. It is not only releasing a machine but also a powder that could see broader adoption. The firm is deploying 3D printing in a cost-conscious way. Epson’s 3D printer launch was not flashy and not supported by a lot of collateral or marketing heft. The company has not made any huge investments in additive. It is also creating a relatively simple 3D printer.
On the powder side, the company is looking at its metal footprint and materials to guide it. It is looking to replace its own virgin materials use most of all. Now, considering the size of Epson as a company and all of its watches and cartridges, the firm has a long way to go. After all, it has over $9 billion in revenue and 67,000 employees.
However, by only covering its own needs, it can become a player in our comparatively tiny market. The 3D printer seems likely to be able to process pellets of many sizes and grades, so as to take on a large selection of known plastic waste materials. Metal waste could be atomized, which would use a lot of energy but would let it be made into accurate MIM parts or 3D printed parts. It’s a very logical approach for the firm.
It would also make sense for the company to release a binder jet machine for production runs lower than can be fulfilled with MIM. Taken together this could be a rather well-defined and -executed recycling strategy for a large company’s metals into new products. I’m not sure how many other firms will look to developing new technologies in tandem with additive to turn to more efficient use and reuse of their materials. Let’s hope that there will be many more.
3D printers have quietly been transforming production lines at some of the world's leading manufacturers. Once considered primarily for prototyping; advancements in materials and productivity have made 3D printers a powerful tool for applications beyond prototyping that range from tooling to end-use parts.
As these 3D Printers move from R&D onto the shop floor the question that keeps coming up is "Will 3D printing ever replace CNC Machining?" The short answer is no because it doesn't need to.
Both 3D Printing and CNC Machining have their place in manufacturing. The truth is they are friends not adversaries. Simply put, these are two different tools in your toolbox! Both are useful, but do different jobs. The key is to know how to use them for your application.
The main difference between the tools is that 3D printing is an additive process while CNC is a subtractive process. 3D printing starts from nothing and builds a part layer by layer. Whereas CNC begins with a stock of material and removes that material until the desired shape is achieved.
Here are the advantages of each:
3D Printing Advantages:
Design Freedom – geometries can be achieved that are otherwise not possible with traditional manufacturing methods (i.e. complexity is freer). This includes:
Part consolidation – assemblies that require multiple parts and fabrication/joining methods can be printed as a single piece.
Lightweighting – 3D printing allows you to put material only where it is needed. You can easily create voids, honeycomb or lattice structures without creating extra steps or energy to remove them.
Speed – There is minimal time from 3D file to part in hand. Multiple variations can be done on the fly.
Less Programming Time – Compared to CNC machining, 3D printing requires much less user interaction to create the machine motion path. In some cases it can be push-button simple but in other cases it may require much more knowledge such as to create optimum support structures for SLA or DMLS.
Less Waste – You only use the material you need to produce the part. Even with support structures, the material consumed is often much less than subtractive. In fact, with some additive processes the left-over material is reusable.
CNC Machining Advantages:
Materials – There is a very broad range of materials available for CNC including metals, plastics and wood. Generally, for high volume production 3D printers it is uncommon to have more than a couple or several material options. Even with the limited number sometimes the changeover can be costly and time consuming.
Tolerance – CNC machining has the ability to machine parts to tight tolerances; frequently 10 to 100 times better than 3D printing.
Surface Finish- The surface finish of parts from CNC machines is often very good depending on the part geometry, tool geometry, and machining time.
General Acceptance of the Output: Due to the certification of pre-existing parts and the CNC manufacturing methodology, many industries are more accepting of CNC machined parts.
Open Architecture – Generally, users of CNC technology purchase their tooling and materials from 3rd party suppliers and enjoy multiple sources for those items; whereas, 3D printer users frequently have to source their supplies from a single source. Most of the time this source being the 3D printer manufacturer. While this is starting to improve, 3D printing has a great deal of catchup to do in this area.
"I think companies need to always be open to change. Not only so that we make quality parts with the machines that we already have, but also looking for ways to improve our capabilities to serve our customers with new ideas and new technology." Sean Farrell, Dura-Metal
Hybrid (CNC & 3D Printing) Approach Benefits:
Better Parts: Combining additive and subtractive processes gives you the design freedom in 3D printing with the tight tolerances only achievable with CNC machining.
Better Shop Floor Utilization- By using 3D printing for design iteration, testing, and production of custom tools and fixtures you free up utilization on CNC machines for profitable, predictable jobs.
Improved Operational Efficiency: By utilizing your machines and equipment for the jobs they are best suited to perform you can extend the life of your machinery and reduce the cost to maintain your equipment.
Deepen Customer Relationships- Combining 3D Printing with CNC machining can allow you to produce parts that you'd otherwise turn down. It also enables you to suggest new ways of making components that could be more valuable to your clients. This can strengthen your business relationship while also attracting new customers & new revenue.
"Our goal with adding 3D Printing was to improve our machine shop efficiency, light-weight certain parts, and reduce assemblies as much as possible. 3D Printing helped us do all of that." Adam Duche, Aerotech Industries
Conclusion:
3D Printing & CNC Machining can indeed work together to serve your customers better. The first step should always be to decide which technology is best for your part. Both processes have their advantages and both complement each other, which can then provide you and your customers with:
Increased flexibility and independence
Time and costs savings
Expanded manufacturing capabilities
improved internal processes
Please join us at one of our two live one-of-a-kind informational in-person events where we will showcase some of the latest metal 3D printing technologies. If you have any interest in learning more about 3D Printing this is a great opportunity! Attendance is free, but you must register to attend.
The first event will be held at the Cimquest headquarters in Branchburg, NJ on April 28, 2022. Attendees will be able to tour our new Metal 3D Printing showroom, interact with parts, and network with other participants. This is a great way to learn about key industry insights in Metal Additive and see how it can open an entirely new world of applications and jobs. Nate Higgins, Co-founder of FreeFORM will be available to discuss their use of 3D Metal Printing.
For the second event, Cimquest is partnering with ABCorp and hosting the event at their facility in Boston, MA on May 4, 2022. ABCorp designs 3D-printed highly-detailed prototypes and parts and they deliver omnichannel content to elevate the customer experience. They will be explaining how they are using additive technologies to grow their business today and in the future. At this event, you'll also get to see the Desktop Metal Shop System live, tour ABCorp's Shop Floor, and interact with parts.
At both events we will be giving away these metal 3D-printed sample parts. Join us for a very informative and enjoyable day and score yourself one of these unique gifts.
About Cimquest:
Cimquest has been a leader in both Additive and Subtractive technologies for over 26 years. Global leadership with many products such as: Mastercam, Desktop Metal and Xact Metal, Cimquest helps to direct companies in their quest for manufacturing excellence. If you are interested in talking to one of our team of experts about selecting or optimizing your additive or subtractive manufacturing technologies, give us a call.
Coming off the heels of an exciting presence at the 2022 AMUG Conference, Divergent Technologies has announced a successful Series C round totaling $160 million in funding. The investment will go toward industrializing its fully integrated platform, which combines generative design, additive manufacturing (AM), and automated assembly. Divergent will also be able to expand its hypercar 3D printing operations and meet the demand from automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) for the design and production of vehicles. As the startup completes the investment round, former President of Goldman Sachs John L. Thornton will join the Divergent Board of Directors.
In the upper right is a blurred out photo of the company’s Divergent Adaptive Production System. Image courtesy of AMUG/Divergent 3D.
The heart of Divergent's business is the Divergent Adaptive Production System (DAPS), which covers the entire design to production workflow for manufacturing. At the moment, this means producing optimized hypercars, like the Czinger 21C, a zero-emissions vehicle that recently beat Circuit of the Americas and Laguna Seca production car track lap records. However, Divergent founder and CEO Kevin Czinger told 3DPrint.com that this same technology can be used to produce anything, from cars to drones. This is because it requires no tooling.
David Beirne, Divergent Board Member and one of the original five GP’s of Benchmark Capital, said as much in the company's recent press release: “The long-term potential for Divergent’s digital manufacturing technology is revolutionary across multiple industries, not just automotive. Its proprietary DAPS system is so adaptable that you could build just about anything efficiently without requiring massive capital investment and a large industrial footprint. Divergent is a game-changer for American manufacturing.”
A look at an exploded view of the 21C reveals how radically different every component looks from traditionally made counterparts. Image courtesy of Czinger Vehicles.
The end product is created with generative design before SLM Solutions' 12-laser metal 3D printers sinter complex metal parts. Finally, a 20-meter-wide robotic cell performs fixture-less assembly of the final product. According to Czinger, this cell is capable of putting together 10,000 complete vehicle structures or up to 150,000 sub-frames annually.
More 3D Printed Cars from Divergent
At AMUG, Czinger wasn't able to disclose everything about his firm, but what he did reveal was more than worthy of the investment. In addition to saying that Divergent will unveil its first public partnership with an automotive OEM this September, he noted that his company will showcase a series of luxury vehicles, including a coupe and an SUV, at Monterey Car Week in August 2022. By 2024, Divergent hopes to replicate its Los Angeles microfactory in Europe, as well.
Divergent’s future vehicles. Image courtesy of AMUG/Divergent 3D.
So far, Divergent has over 500 patents field, as well as more than 180 engineers and scientists across its four divisions: Structures, Software (HPC, GD and AI), Additive Manufacturing (Hardware, Software and Materials) and Automation (Software, Optics and Robotics). As the company expands, it hopes to build out a global network of DAPS factories that ultimately operate in a circular fashion.
“This funding represents a sterling affirmation of how disruptive we are in the auto manufacturing industry, one that really hasn’t experienced such revolution since Henry Ford developed the assembly line more than 100 years ago,” said Czinger. “Of great importance, given the global focus on sustainability, DAPS is planet-saving manufacturing in that it radically reduces lifecycle environmental impact by optimizing total vehicle 'cradle-to-cradle' efficiency."
Joining the Board of Directors is John L. Thornton, former President of Goldman Sachs, who not only invested in this Series C round, but in previous financing rounds as well. Thornton also served as Executive Chairman of Barrick Gold and a Board Member of Ford Motor Company.
Kevin Czinger with 21C 3D printer hypercar. Image courtesy of @iamted7.
“Seeing Divergent in action is seeing the future of automotive manufacturing now. This system will become the norm in the industry. The transformation in manufacturing which Divergent will lead will be good for the US, good for jobs, good for efficiency, for productivity and for climate," Thornton said.
As we see numerous auto manufacturers like VW, Ford, and BMW adopt AM, gradually ramping up to production parts for consumer vehicles, Divergent will be the first to put a largely 3D printed car on the road. The C21 will be manufactured in a lot of 80 vehicles, but Divergent plans to expand to more accessible automobiles as it uses its proceeds to scale up. Partnering with eight leading OEMs, Divergent is primed to drive up the use of AM across the entire auto industry. It's now wonder then that the 3D printing industry is expected to reach over $50 billion by 2030.
