How Will 3D Printing Change Our Lives?

As 3D Printing goes mainstream, it's time to put on our thinking caps and see how we can use it.

It remains to be seen precisely how 3D printing technology will transform our lives, but one major player in the industry, despite posting a less-than-optimal earnings report for the fourth quarter, envisions taking their products to the mainstream in the near future.

Stratasys, a company that manufactures 3D printers and the systems that power them, recently announced a net loss of $2 million for the fourth quarter of 2013, representing four cents per share. An adjusted measurement, however, for that same time period indicated earnings of 50 cents per share.

For David Reis, the company’s CEO, the future for the company remains exceedingly bright thanks to expanded distribution and a newly-minted consumer unit. The company’s goal, he said, is to introduce its products to more and more consumers so as to eventually encourage them to look into acquiring its industrial-strength systems.

“Those who believe that enhancing the user experience and providing a full 3D printing solution for users of the desktop product will drive future sales of our higher-priced systems,” Reis recently said on an earnings call.

Stratasys is betting on everyday people like you and me ultimately determining that we need 3D printing in our lives. Let’s take a look at some hypothetical examples where the technology would provide us with unprecedented convenience.

Real Life Applications

Imagine you’re a landlord who oversees a substantial amount of units, enough to keep you very busy every day. It’s a Sunday night when all of a sudden you receive a number of phone calls from your tenants complaining of an infestation of mice. You don’t have any rodent control supplies on hand, and since it’s so late, the stores that would sell such an item are all closed. Money is kind of tight so you’d rather not call an exterminator, but in this case, you don’t really have a choice.

Now imagine you had access to a 3D printer and knew how to use it. Whenever you ran out of your previous exterminating tools, you could simply go to the printer and create a new supply of them. If such an infestation were to occur again, you’d be prepared and wouldn’t have to fork over the big bucks to hire an exterminator.

On the other side of the coin, let’s say that you manage a team of marine biologists who survey various bodies of water to make sure that they are up to standards. One of the pieces of equipment upon which your team relies is a dissolved oxygen meter. Because you’re always out in the field, from time to time, accidents occur and certain pieces of the equipment are damaged. It takes quite some time to get the devices fixed the old-fashioned way.

But armed with 3D printing technology, you’re able to commission the pieces that need to be replaced quickly. Once created, you can attach them to the device and voila, they’re as good as new.

Because of the extraordinary levels of convenience such technology provides, it’s not hard to imagine just how much 3D printing will change our lives. But first, it’s up to companies like Stratasys to blaze the trail of new technology and transform it into something we can’t live without.