This 3D Printer Is 15 Times Faster, and the Army Is Already Buying It

If 3D printing is going to hit speed that manufacturing requires, the improvement will need to be exponential.

EXPERT OPINION BY HOWARD TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH INVESTORS @TULLMAN

Photo: Impossible Objects

I think we’ve all concluded that the bloom is somewhat off the rose in terms of 3D printing. Like so many extraordinary advances in science and technology that appear akin to magic for a while, watching a machine that looked vaguely like your microwave turn spools of plastic into physical representations of everyday objects you’d just drawn on your computer was a pretty amazing experience. You could print precision parts, you could print pizzas, and eventually you could print entire buildings. And while Yoda from Star Wars was for years the most frequently printed object, there were plenty of serious and important applications in pharmaceuticals, construction and surgery, to name a few.

There was, however, an unspoken issue that too many of the earliest enthusiasts overlooked, whether intentionally or inadvertently—or because so much of the formative experimentation and developmental work took place in academic environments where time and money were secondary concerns. In any event, for whatever reason, 3D printing hit a fairly substantial barrier in the area of manufacturing, where you might have expected that it would absolutely and........

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