EEVblog Electronics Community Forum
General => General Technical Chat => Topic started by: nixfu on May 05, 2015, 03:17:59 pm
-
3D printing still a novelty? One startup wants to bring the tech phenomenon into large-scale manufacturing.
On Monday, CloudDDM unveiled a 3D printing factory embedded in the heart of UPS' worldwide hub in Louisville, Ky.
The first-of-its kind, fully-automated facility will be able to use the tie-in to UPS to ship its products quickly.
"We'll have 100 high-tech 3D printers running 24 hours, 7 days a week," said CloudDDM's founder Mitch Free. And it'll need just three employees: one for each of the eight-hour shifts. (UPS will handle all of the packaging and shipping logistics.)
Because of this tie-in with the UPS Worldport Hub, any order placed through CloudDDM that takes under 4 hours to print and is submitted to the company by 6 pm Pacific time, will be delivered the next day. The system automatically provides an estimated build time and checks to see if machines are available. It then will notify the customer if the product can be shipped to them the next day or not.
In what could eventually become an Amazon-like service for 3D printed items, CloudDDM certainly seems to be a leader in this rapidly growing industry.
As business picks up, he expects to expand the Louisville operation to as many as 1,000 3D printers.
http://money.cnn.com/2015/05/04/smallbusiness/cloudddm-3d-printing-factory-ups/ (http://money.cnn.com/2015/05/04/smallbusiness/cloudddm-3d-printing-factory-ups/)
More: http://3dprint.com/62642/cloudddm-ups/ (http://3dprint.com/62642/cloudddm-ups/)
More: http://www.cloudddm.com/ (http://www.cloudddm.com/)
I wonder what the costs are.