Our Mission

Our mission is to create a sustainable and universally accessible manufacturing network using 3D printing technologies

Sustainability is defined as avoidance of the depletion of natural resources in order to maintain an ecological balance. Today most of the world's plastic and durable goods come from China which has created a global supply chain with inefficiencies of:

Overproduction

Factories require large minimum orders for companies to keep their cost of goods low. When a company has many products, the amount of over-production is vast and leads to excessive use of raw materials, energy, and labor, depleting natural resources and driving unnecessary environmental degradation and increased carbon emissions.

High Logistical Costs

Overproduction leads to increases in transporation, storage and fulfillment costs for the company and the consumer. These high carrying costs are especially wasteful if the goods don't sell. Companies eventually liquidated the goods at a loss or just send them right to landfill.

Reduced Profits and Affordability

These challenges are bad for business. The Company becomes less profitable and take on more losses, which are then passed to the end consumer in the form of higher prices or lower quality in products.

Bad For Innovation

While lower profitability for Companies is not our primary concern, it does create barriers to innovation for new products. New companies have a harder time bringing what may be a better product to market, and existing companies cut their losses, going with what works.

Plastics Problem

Plastics are created from petrochemicals through a chemical reaction that makes them very difficult to break down. Plastics in landfill and oceans do not break down for hundreds of years, and choke the process that bio-degradable materials follow to become organic matter. Today it costs much less to create more Plastics rather than any attempts at recycling. This drives an unsustainable cycle where the future will be completely choked with bits of plastic.

Disclaimer: There is irreplacable value in traditional manufacturing and use of plastics. Our vision is a complimentary style of manufacturing powered by 3D Printers which can severely reduce the wasted resources surrounding production, use and recycling of plastic goods.

How can 3D Printing Help

Our fundamental belief is that mass consumer adoption of 3D Printers can address these problems. Consider that 3D Printing:

Supports On-demand production

Plastic products and goods can be printed one item at a time. Each item can be customized digitally and does not require molds to be created or any upfront cost aside from having the printer and the material.

Lower Shipping Fees and Remove Inventory

Mass adoption of 3D Printers means each city, suburb and community will have a set of 3D Printers that can serve the needs locally. This allows any destination to access a large catalog of Printable 3D Models, reducing shipping fees and inventory carrying costs.

Increase Accessibility

Because 3D Printers are based on digital designs, the number of products and functions are only limited by the imaginations of those that know how to draw in 3D. Functional designs that minimize material usage are more profitable and can be transferred around the world instantly.

Unlock Individual Innovation

Today 3D Printing is used for rapid prototyping as empowers someone to test an idea out quickly and cheaply. Without the high upfront costs of expensive minimum orders or injection molds, 3D Printing lowers the obstacles to get a useful design into the market quickly and to serve a community without worrying about breaking even.

Recycle Plastics Into Filament

One of the major contributers to the plastic problem is one-use waterbottles. Many of these use PETG Plastic, which is a commonly used material type for 3D Printing and the technology to recycle plastic bottles into filament for 3D printing already exists.

What will it take to get there?

Better Printers

Even the best 3D Printers today still require owners to go through a technical learning curve across building the printer, converting 3d models to printable files (slicing) and maintenance. There is still room for improvement in printers to reach a 1-click experience (similar to 2D Printers)

Cheaper Printers

When printers drop below $300, mass consumer adoption will accelerate significantly. Today the cost for a highly reliable, low maintenance and easy setup printer with some learning curve is still ~$800+.

Incentive For Designers

The usefulness of 3D Printing comes from the number of 3D Models available. Today, there is no current incentive for 3D Designers as their designs are not protected, and there is no clear way to monetize them. When there is a way to make a living as a 3D model designer, the number of applications of 3D Printing will grow.