The greatest obstacle to 3-D printing’s takeover of the manufacturing process (besides its slow pace of operation and difficulty in cost-efficiently scaling to mass production) is the fact that there’s been no easy way to produce electronics. You can’t print out a smartphone, because all the important components will still need to be plugged in. You can’t print out a Kindle, or a new router, or a Roomba, or what have you. All you could ever print was the external casing, and that means nothing without circuitry to make things work. The need for external components won’t be eliminated (you’d still need batteries, for example), but by enabling users of 3D Systems Corporation (NYSE:DDD) printers to create the circuitry for their custom devices, PARC could open up a whole new wave of manufacturing.
Manufacturing processes today take a number of diverse components and place them together just so to make a functional device. iRobot Corporation (NASDAQ:IRBT) has hit on the next logical step — 3-D printed devices with completely automated assembly — but it still needs circuitry. A PARC chiplet printer installed next to a 3D Systems Corporation (NYSE:DDD) printer, with the requisite automation technologies, could finally make 3-D printing a viable manufacturing format for complex electronics. Since nearly everything we use now comes with some kind of embedded circuitry, the inability to replicate the electronic functionality of mass-manufactured goods in a 3D Systems Corporation (NYSE:DDD) printer would have remained a stumbling block even after the speed issue might be solved. Now, it’s speed that remains the primary obstacle. Circuitry is within reach.
This is one step closer to my dream for 2025: distributed, small-scale, on-demand manufacturing. The 3-D printer simply doesn’t make sense as the next laser printer. It’s far more complex and requires far more technical expertise, and its output is less readily useful in entry-level consumer machines. However, when manufacturing becomes easier to do in high-tech automated warehouses stuffed with top-notch 3D Systems Corporation (NYSE:DDD) printers than it is in massive factories, the shift will be on. We’ve got a few years before that prediction’s set to come true, and PARC has already pushed it in the right direction. Let’s see if the 3-D printing companies can solve the speed problem in the meantime.
The article Will This Tiny Technology Mean the End of China’s Manufacturing Dominance? originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by Alex Planes.
Fool contributor Alex Planes holds no financial position in any company mentioned here. Add him on Google+ or follow him on Twitter @TMFBiggles for more insight into markets, history, and technology.The Motley Fool recommends 3D Systems, iRobot, and Stratasys. The Motley Fool owns shares of 3D Systems and Stratasys and has the following options: Short Jan 2014 $36 Calls on 3D Systems and Short Jan 2014 $20 Puts on 3D Systems.
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