Rapid Prototyping Equipment Financing
A Matter of Materials
Materials technology is just as important to the RP industry as platform technology. For many applications, the RP materials that are available, not the platform, determine which type of RP system will be used to create the solid.
Because of this, companies that provide RP materials are constantly trying to expand the range of materials they offer, and they seem to be succeeding. New materials come to market all the time, some for use with established platforms and some for use in newly developed RP systems.
New materials define the scope of emerging RP systems
and recast the role of old platforms
When new materials become available for an established platform, their availability will enhance its value and longevity. When new materials become available for an emerging platform, their availability will enhance the new platform, often at the expense of older platforms.
As it now stands, the most diverse range of materials is available in powder form for use in laser sintering systems. When formed, various sintered materials can exhibit characteristics that are typical of plastics, metals, sand, waxes used in investment casting, and ceramics. The current range of liquid photopolymer materials available for use in stereolithography systems keeps growing, too. For instance, one of the most promising classes of new SLA materials is composite (filled) resin. The same goes for every other type of platform, including those based on inkjet technologies and layer cutting technologies.
Because improved materials make RP platform move valuable, RP systems makers try to develop new materials for their machine. Independent companies also make RP materials, but if the platform makers appreciate this, they have not been particularly expressive; they want to control or at least dominate the market in materials for their platforms. But the platform makers can't always get their way.
In some cases, notably photopolymers, users prefer the materials offered by independents such as Somos and Vantico to those offered by platform makers like 3D Systems. A similar situation has developed in the market for sintering powders. Both EOS and 3D have developed improved (and similar) plastic powders that give users additional choices.
Every participant in the RP industry takes the race to create new materials seriously. The battlefronts are not all in the marketplace. There has been plenty of fighting in the courts, too, stemming from disputes over the rights to various materials and their production technologies. The situation can only get more complicated as low-end RP systems gain popularity.
As less costly platforms catch on, hardware cost per system will decline but the value of RP consumables will increase and could eventually exceed that of RP platforms.
You can look at rapid prototyping as a process that adds value to raw materials, such as photopolymers or sintering powders, by transforming them into various solids. For RP to be economically viable, the value added during the life of an RP system must exceed the cost of the platform and its maintenance, the materials the platform consumes, and the labor involved in creating shaped materials.
When a customer buys an RP system, the only way to make that system pay its way is to use it, and use it efficiently. The cost of the system can't be changed once it is acquired. By contrast, the cost of materials used by the system may change. If that cost goes down and the system gets steady use, the total operating cost of the RP installation becomes more favorable. If the cost does not fall, or if it rises, the platform will have a harder time paying its dues.
By developing lower cost materials, or materials which produce more valuable objects, an RP platform maker can extend the life of its platforms. However, if improved materials will only work with new platform, these materials can accelerate the rate at which customers migrate to emerging technology. Clearly, new RP systems that are both cheaper to buy and cheaper to use are doubly attractive, and stand to have a very significant impact on the installed base of more costly alternatives. This is why makers of high-end RP platform keep a keen eye on new materials that expand the horizons of low-end platforms, and why independent makers of modeling materials see their efforts as a way to create significant breakthroughs in the industry.
While all this sounds terribly positive, RP users, RP equipment makers and companies like NCP that finance RP systems are concerned about one aspect of the unfolding future. There is always a possibility that some striking breakthrough in RP materials will come along, transforming the RP landscape and the value of older platforms in ways that could not have been foreseen. No matter how good this would be for RP in the long run, it would be very unsettling in the short run.
So be careful what you wish for. You just might get it.
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