Gartner just put out yet another report which discusses 3D printing to some extend, They predict that by 2018, the annual loss due to 3D Printing to Intellectual Property holders will exceed $100 billion. That's a huge number considering we are only 4-5 years away. IP theft will be a major concern for corporations as the prevalence of 3D printers spread throughout the globe.
More details on report:
http://www.itwire.com/business-it-ne...osses%E2%80%99
3D printers are prototyping machines. The quality of the print is, in general, lower than what the manufacturers are producing and the time it takes to make them on a printer is not market competitive. If these companies can't adapt to the changing market and changing technologies then they don't deserve to stay in business.
I can only speak for myself, but I have seen neat ideas in-store, but thought, "hey, I can print this!";
Also I made adapters and used models of products allready available online.
I don't think this will result in everyone printing at home in a few years, but it allready shows that a 3d printer can produce usable parts and copying things can be done by a mediocre 3D modeler such as I am.
I think KDog is right, a business can compete (higher production numbers are cheaper with injection molding, fit better, look better, work out of the box), if they keep the price reasonable.
Perhaps 3D printing will change the current scenario, where a Adapter from the hardware store costs 20 dollars, but is made out of 2 cent wort of plastic!
;-)
Well not totaly,
Someone will need to make the printers and plastics aswell ^^
So like its always, as you make new technologies and corporations, You will also lose those that wont evolve with its time ^^
As Kdog said for most things we will still have to actualy buy it,
But ye in the future aka 2018-2020 there are maybe higher res printers aswell for consumer grade prices ^^
DrLuigi, you say it best. Sure the printer market will take jobs away from millions of people eventually. However, it will also create new jobs, and make millions of other jobs easier to perform. All in all, the world will become more productive because of 3d printing, and there will be less need to purchase things, so there will be less need for money, and less need for jobs in general.
Well, I posted this on another thread which was closed since it was similar to this one. So I am posting here now.
3D printing is the next revolution. I think that it will help the economy rather than hurting it. Lets look at some of the aspects.
Jobs - It will create a whole new genre of jobs. Designers, developers - hardware and software, maintenance guys, support guys and many more. It is something like the computer revolution which gave birth to giants like Google and Microsoft who now employ millions of people.
Production - As the technology improves, it will be used for production. 3d printing will increase the rate of production, decrease the cost and add more flexibility to it.
Environment, Time and Cost of Transport - This may sound futuristic. Today when we need something at Place A, we transport it from place B. In future, 3d printing may make it possible to print that part at Place A itself. Imagine the amount of fuel we will save and the amount of green house gases which will be reduced as a result of this. This would be something akin to today's video conferencing. One of NASA's aim in sending a 3d printer in space is precisely this. To save on the cost of transporting small parts from Earth to the Space Station!!
I will keep adding to this interesting thread. Cheers.
Vishesh
www.3dprintronics.com
In other words:
Quote:
I say to you that the 3D printer is to the American Manufacturer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.
In my opinion the best thing for any economy is access to quality items as cheap prices. When everyone in an economy can afford awesome things, the economy is chugging along beautifully. Yes, 3D Printing will take jobs, but it will also create jobs. More important is the fact that nominal prices for almost everything should come down, making the vast majority of people better off. That's called economic growth.
What this means is that they'll get a reason to add an extra tax for anything related to 3D printing. Kinda like what we already have on hard drives and other storage media. And all just because the device can assumably be used to print something that resembles a copyrighted design.
It's going to be hard to tax it when you can just print out another 3d printer practically. Sure they could tax the filament, but there will be ways around it. They will start selling spools of plastic and say it's for other purposes, or people will simply figure out easy ways of recycling their own plastics to make filament themselves. I highly doubt they will be able to tax 3D Printing enough to slow it down. The last 18 months we have seen the market practically explode with innovation, yet we are only at the tip of the iceberg. It's a fun industry to follow. I can't imagine what it will look like in 5-10 years, let alone 30-40.