Whether it's companies such as Amazon changing up the way books and other common retail products are purchased to new innovations such as Bitcoin and further revisions to PayPal/eBay changing up the entirety of the marketplace itself, there's no question that disruptive technology is becoming far more, well ... disruptive with every new entry into the field.
Now we have 3-D printing, and the machines that allow for the uncannily easy home manufacturing of everything from chocolates to guns to prosthetic body parts, all made from materials as varied as plastic and metal (or more) are becoming evermore accessible to the general public.
"We're on the verge of the next industrial revolution, no doubt about it," Dartmouth College business professor Richard D'Aveni said via an Associated Press report published on Sunday, June 2. "In 25 years, entire industries are going to disappear. Countries relying on mass manufacturing are going to find themselves with no revenues and no jobs."
The real issue here being the simplicity of 3-D printing (in many cases) and the fact that some printing machines come in sizes as small as a conventional microwave oven. Although there are those 3-D printing machines that might cost in excess of $500,000, there are also those that are going for as little as $400.
This means that we could very nearly be seeing a day in which consumers could just print out products they might want rather than going to the trouble of actually purchasing the items in question at stores (or even via online retailers). What used to seem to be something we could only imagine in the likes of the Star Trek universe will ostensibly be rock-hard reality soon enough.
The question, though, does remain about whether the prevalence of 3-D printing will bring about global peace and prosperity as seen in Star Trek ... or if it will reign down a kind of worldwide economic disaster we've only felt a taste of since 2008's collapse. After all, if consumers no longer have to buy things and can just print them out, what will happen to all those industrial manufacturers (not to mention retailers) left in the lurch?
"We believe that 3-D printing is fundamentally changing the manufacturing ecosystem in its entirety - how and where products are made and by whom," Shapeways (a company that makes/sells 3-D printed products) CEO Peter Weijmarshausen said.
Shapeways sells products that range in price from the likes of an $8 egg-shaped cup to a mushroom-cloud-shaped lamp that costs $1400. It's indeed clear that just about anything is possible via the realm of 3-D printing.
"We're going to see innovation happening at a much higher rate, introduction of products at a much higher rate," Vice President of Direct Digital Manufacturing at Stratasys Inc. Jeff DeGrange said.
DeGrange knows what he's talking about: Stratasys is, according to Associated Press, the leader of all 3-D printer companies (of which there are currently about 50 worldwide).
"We live in an on-demand world now, and we'll see production schedules are going to be greatly compressed."
DeGrange sees a future in 3-D printing in which even large parts for transportation vessels such as planes will be printed (along with the tools to fix them). This means we may also be soon seeing the end of warehouse storage facility for such parts, along with the other ancillary establishments (and industries) thus associated.
Since making its way into the mainstream marketplace as long ago as 2007, 3-D printing has been scrutinized, analyzed and invested in by NASA, the military and even President Barack Obama's administration, which recently spearheaded a $30 pilot program into the uses of the technology on a more wide scale level. IBIS World, a company that analyzes the industry, has also released reports that the realm has grown by 7.2 percent every year since 2007 and that revenue observed since 2011 will likely double by 2015.
The notion that 3-D printing will be quite as disruptive as some of these opinions would have us believe does have its detractors, of course.
"I think 3-D has the capacity to impact both products and processes," Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation Senior Economist Cliff Waldman said. "I am not ready to say that it is completely disruptive, however. It might be in a few narrow industries."
Major office retail chain Staples plans to be the first of its breed to offer 3-D printers starting this month. Consumers can look forward to "the Cube," which will run them $1300 and will be followed by a 3-D printing pen (much like a glue gun) that will be as low-cost as $50.
No matter what the new wave of 3-D printing technology will do to our already fragile financial ecosystem, there's no doubt it's already well on its way to do it.
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