Metal 3D Printing & Additive Manufacturing

Metal 3D printing company 3DEO, Inc., based in Los Angeles and founded in 2016, grew a lot last year, having used its patented Intelligent Layering Technology to 3D print and ship over 30,000 paid parts to customers in multiple industries in 2018. It appears that this growth isn’t slowing down either, as the company is more than doubling its production capacity this quarter to meet customer demand with its proprietary metal 3D printers. It’s only the first day of March, and 3DEO has already locked down two more customer production orders that are scheduled for delivery this year, one for 24,000 pieces and another for 28,000.

Back in 2012, there were a lot of inflated expectations regarding the role that metal 3D printing would soon play in medical device manufacturing. Matt Sand is a product of that hype cycle because it was around that time that he, as an entrepreneur, started getting excited about the possibilities of 3D printing. Today, Sand is a co-founder and president of 3DEO.

3DEO, Inc., a metal 3D printed part provider based in Los Angeles, has announced it is increasing its production capability over twofold for the first quarter of 2019. The expansion for 3DEO comes as a response to greater customer demand, with the company experiencing significant growth in 2018, its second full year of operation.

The pace of technological growth and change is higher today than perhaps at any other point in human history. Blockchain, artificial intelligence, augmented/virtual reality—the list of potentially revolutionary breakthroughs now at our fingertips is long and growing. Of all the promising nascent technologies out there, however, none is closer to bringing real change to the way we live and work than additive manufacturing.

3DEO’s President, Matt Sand, will be speaking at the upcoming MD&M West conference; a must-attend event for any medtech professional. The conference is in Anaheim, CA on February 5-7, and is the largest three-day medtech conference in North America. 

As our industry continues to expand, and with optimistic forecasts coming from many additive manufacturing experts, competition for talent is also intensifying. Here we report several recent moves in the 3D printing industry.

Intelligent Layering for Economical Metal 3D Printing

A related but proprietary and unique process developed by 3DEO, dubbed Intelligent Layering, takes on six distinct steps to deliver high quality parts at a cost that’s competitive with CNC machining and metal injection molding (MIM) at production volumes. The process produces a superior surface finish and tolerances as compared to any other metal AM process.

California-based 3DEO manufacturers 3D-printed metal parts using its own proprietary printers. With a heavy focus on reducing the per-part cost of metal 3D printing, the company claims its patent-pending Intelligent Layering technology is able to fabricate parts that meet quality MPIF Standard 35 and reduce the final cost of printing a part by as much as 80 percent. The company primarily works with stainless steel powder but is currently developing technology to print with other metals as well including Inconel, nickel alloy, cobalt chrome, titanium, soft magnetic alloys, Tungsten heavy alloy, and bronze, copper, and brass.

Suppliers take note.

Parts consumers are not the only ones benefiting from 3D printing. Metal parts supplier 3DEO makes precision-engineered metal components on demand with its proprietary 3D metal printers featuring patented Intelligent Layering technology. The company specializes in manufacturing low/medium volumes, including complex part designs, and is selectively accepting new high-volume orders.

Even though additive manufacturing and 3D printing (AM/3DP) are still in the early adoption phase by most medical device manufacturers (MDMs), these technologies continue to evolve at a rapid pace. Today, most AM/3DP applications in the medical industry are for prototype development, anatomical models, and “one-off” custom components. 3D-printed surgical instrumentation and cutting guides for procedures such as knee, spinal, and dental implants are on the rise. On the manufacturing side, AM/3DP is used to make components for prototype mold tools, conformal cooling inserts for production tools, and jigs and fixtures for making or inspecting production parts.