3D printing has come a long way and the advances continue. Announced October 18, 2017, highlighting its speed and inkjet technology, Popular Science recognized the Desktop Metal Production System with its "2017 Best of What's New" award in the Engineering category. The Production System is the first metal 3D printing system for mass production of complex metal parts that is up to 100 times faster than current laser systems. Arriving in 2018, the Production System delivers the speed, quality, and cost-per-part needed to compete with traditional manufacturing processes.
Created by the inventors of ground-breaking technologies in both 3D and 2D printing – binder jetting by Ely Sachs and single pass inkjet by Paul Hoisington – the Production System builds metal parts in a matter of minutes instead of hours. Leveraging low-cost Metal Injection Molding (MIM) powder, it is designed to deliver high throughput and per-part costs that are competitive with traditional manufacturing processes—up to 20x lower than today's laser-based additive manufacturing systems.
Desktop Metal, the company committed to making metal 3D printing accessible to manufacturers and engineers, recently launched its metal 3D printing systems covering the full product lifecycle -- from prototyping to mass production. The Studio System is the first office-friendly metal 3D printing system for rapid prototyping and is up to 10 times less expensive than existing technology today. To manufacture metal 3D printed parts at scale, Desktop Metal also debuted the only 3D printing system for mass production of high resolution metal parts today, the Production System.