Staying ahead of the technology curve means strengthening your competitive advantage. That is why we give you data-driven innovation insights into Industry 4.0. This time, you get to discover 5 hand-picked rapid prototyping startups.
Global Startup Heat Map: 5 Top Rapid Prototyping Startups
The 5 industry 4.0 startups you will explore below are chosen based on our data-driven startup scouting approach, taking into account factors such as location, founding year, and relevance of technology, among others. This analysis is based on the Big Data & Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered StartUs Insights Discovery Platform, covering over 1.3 million startups & scaleups globally.
The Global Startup Heat Map below highlights the 5 rapid prototyping startups & scaleups our Innovation Researchers curated for this report. Moreover, you get insights into regions that observe a high startup activity and the global geographic distribution of the 599 companies we analyzed for this specific topic.
Crenodez Studio – End-to-End Rapid Prototyping
Additive manufacturing brings speed, affordability, and precision to product development. Rapid prototyping considerably helps product developers gain a physical perspective of their product and make iterations. Industry 4.0 startups leverage various 3D printing technologies to enable affordable and scalable rapid prototyping solutions.
Indian startup Crenodez Studio offers end-to-end product development services including rapid prototyping and manufacturing-at-scale. The startup leverages additive manufacturing technologies such as fused deposition modeling (FDM), digital light processing (DLP), and multi-jet fusion (MJF). Crenodez’s clients include members of the aerospace, consumer electronics, and automotive industries, as well as in the manufacturing and healthcare industries.
STUDIO SOWOW – Vacuum Thermoforming
Tools required for vacuum forming have a quick turnaround when they are 3D printed. Rapid prototyping includes the development of molds that are used in thermoforming processes. 3D printed thermoforming molds have significantly higher readiness in comparison to traditional thermoforming molds. In this way, startups develop 3D printed parts and molds that do not require additional modifications.
British startup STUDIO SOWOW delivers rapid prototyping services to customers in the aerospace and retail industries. The startup utilizes computer-aided manufacturing techniques, vacuum casting and forming, and 3D printing solutions to deliver prototypes of any shape or form. By using stereolithography (SLA), the startup also accurately eliminates the need for multiple expensive iterations.
MetalMaker 3D – Investment Casting
Traditional metal casting is a cumbersome process that consumes a significant portion of resources. However, 3D printing opens avenues for replicating metal casting processes with significant reductions to cost and time. Startups develop high-precision metal additive manufacturing alternatives to overcome market challenges.
The US-based startup MetalMaker 3D develops an alternative to high-precision metal 3D printing. The startup’s process integrates 3D printing with investment casting to create functional metal parts. These parts are based on free designs that also maintain the mechanical and dimensional properties of a high-precision metal casting. Additionally, the startup’s small-scale foundry systems provide in-house metal additive manufacturing and are scalable from prototyping to small batch production.
x3D Group – Rapid Prototyping Printers
One of the developments in additive manufacturing is liquid crystal display (LCD)- based 3D-printing. This technique uses an affordable LCD screen to create a mask, eliminating the requirement of digital micromirrors that are typically expensive. To this end, startups develop 3D printers to improve the speed and reduce the cost of rapid prototyping.
French startup x3D Group provides 3D printing systems and software for industrial rapid prototyping. The startup offers 3D printing resins for SLA and LCD process. Additionally, the startup offers a standard template library (STL) editor software that allows the conversion of files to STL and repairing errors, as well as editing designs and preparing build platforms.
BCN3D – Desktop 3D Printers
Products that require less space to manufacture benefit from using desktop 3D printers for rapid prototyping. Research and development (R&D) teams use such 3D printers to design and develop prototypes in the lab to significantly reduce the product development time. Startups develop innovative desktop 3D printers to enable rapid prototyping for laboratory settings.
Spanish startup BCN3D develops SIGMA D25, a desktop 3D printer that is powered by the patented Independent Dual Extruder (IDEX) system. This 3D printer is user-friendly and equipped with full connectivity. SIGMA D25 also has a high print volume, making it ideal for rapid prototyping and product development.
Discover more Industry 4.0 Startups
To keep you up-to-date on the latest technology and emerging solutions, we provide you with actionable innovation intelligence – quickly and exhaustively. You can download our free Industry 4.0 Innovation Report and discover new business opportunities or save your time & let us look into your areas of interest. We provide you with an exhaustive overview of new startups, scaleups & emerging technologies that matter to you.