3D printer Sales have exploded at an astronomical rate this past year. The majority of the 3D printer sales have come primarily through companies and schools with that number skyrocketing to nearly 70% increase last year. As an industry the sales of 3D printers have averaged a steady 25% annual growth over the past 27 years. According to the 21st edition Wohlers Report, which shows that from 2014-2015, the retail price of a desktop printer has jumped from below $5,000 to 163,999 to a record high $278,385.
President of Industry Research firm Wohlers Associates Terry Wohler said that while relatively inexpensive, desktop 3D printers are still capable of producing exceptional models for your early concept modeling of new designs thus making them extremely cost-effective. Terry likens it to when AutoCAD was introduced in the early 1980s and how it could not do everything the normal version of the CAD software could but it did just enough making it a value-based alternative.
This was also true with the early Desktop Computers in comparison to the more expensive UNIX workstations/ mini computers that DEC supplied. Worldwide revenue figures estimate that the additive manufacturing and 3D printing industry is on pace to reach $12.8 billion dollars by 2018 and by 2020 that figure is expected to exceed $21 billion. This estimate is a direct result of an annual study conducted by the Wohler’s Report compiling data on over 51 industrial system manufacturers, 15 third-party material producers, 98 service providers and numerous manufacturers of low-cost desktop 3D printers.
With the industry transitioning from a protyping past to a production future, the opportunities for additive manufacturing in production applications are booming. Tim Caffrey who is a senior consultant at Wohlers Associates and is the principal author of the report believes that the money is in manufacturing and not prototyping citing that in 2014 there were only 49 computer hardware manufacturers selling industrial-grade additive manufacturing systems that were valued at more than $5,000. That figure has jumped to 62 as of 2015 which coincidentally is twice as many as the 31 companies that did so in 2011.
The compound annual growth rate of the additive manufacturing industry of the past 3 years is roughly 34% and over the past 27 years the compound annual growth for the industry as a whole is close to 27%. That number will only climb and has manifested to the tune of $5.1 billion dollars in sales or service this past year.
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