Freeform
A metal 3D printing company deploying a manufacturing-as-a-service business model has emerged from stealth with 45 million USD in funding.
California-based Freeform is working to implement ‘software-defined autonomous printing factories’ powered by a proprietary technology stack. The company is founded by leaders and engineers from SpaceX, while former employees of Velo3D, Carbon, Tesla and Apple are also part of the Freeform team.
Harnessing its suite of metal 3D printing and software technologies, Freeform’s mission is to bring on-demand production to mainstream industries. The company claims that its 3D printing technology ‘eliminates historical production barriers’ – such as a heavy reliance on human labour – and will allow manufacturers to quickly go from idea to volume production. Freeform has developed its technology, the company says, to quicken the pace of innovation and deliver a more efficient way to scale production.
“While at SpaceX, I leveraged metal 3D printing to accelerate the development of numerous rocket engines. We were innovating in ways that were not possible before and accelerating our trajectory toward the future; however, we ultimately realised that it was impossible to print at production scale using even the best current technologies,” commented Erik Palitsch, co-founder and CEO of Freeform. “We founded Freeform to solve this problem and to make this transformative technology available to all industries, giving anyone the ability to rapidly take an idea and produce it at scale. We’re bringing the best talent of the planet together to disrupt the manufacturing industry, and with our recent fundraise, we’re excited to scale production capacity to make printing at scale available to all industries.”
Within its scalable factories, Freeform will lean on advanced sensing, real-time controls and data-driven learning in a scalable factory architecture. Prior to emerging from stealth, Freeform has already commenced work with industrial customers. Embark, a developer of autonomous technology for the trucking industry, is using Freeform to get its products to market, while aerospace firm Ursa Major is working with the company to manufacture rocket engine parts.
“As Embark brings autonomous trucking technology to market, we need the ability to seamlessly scale up from prototype to production,” said Brandon Connors, Head of Programs and Manufacturing at Embark Trucks. “That means sourcing commercial-grade metal parts on short timelines, consistently and at a practical cost. Freeform’s printing service helps us meet our manufacturing needs, improves supply chain reliability, and gives us the ability to change deigns without impacting delivery time, so that we can accelerate the deployment of our technology.”
“Freeform offers us the ability to scale up from prototype to production,” offered Ursa Major Chief Operations Officer Nick Doucette. “Freeform’s printing service gives us the ability to change designs rapidly without impacting production cost or delivery time. We are able to get consistent, high-quality metal parts in days instead of weeks.”
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