Kickstarter
Yesterday saw the launch of 3Doodler on Kickstarter, as it stands, with 32 days to go, the project has 1800% of its goal. This isn’t the first 3D printing success story on Kickstarter and I'm pretty sure it won’t be the last.
Since its launch in 2009 $490million has been pledged by over 3.4 million people on Kickstarter. Whilst technological projects only equate for 2.12% of all projects started, the £41m pledged to tech equates to 8.5% of the total pledge amount.
Here we take a look at some of the previous 3D printing Kickstarter projects and find out how they’re coming along.
Printrbot, $830,827 pledged of $25,000 goal
Former pastor Brook Drumm launched his DIY 3D printer on Kickstarter in November 2011, within 13 days the project was 1,000% (that extra zero is not a typo) funded, by the end of the 30 days of funding it was 3,323% funded, backers include Makerbot’s Bre Pettis.
Printrbot now have four models including the Printrbot Jr, which was unsuccessful at achieving funding on Kickstarter. Printrbot have also just launched their first app, MAKRZ, a community of makers sharing open source 3D models to rival their backer Bre Pettis’ Thingiverse
As of January ’13, there are Printrbots in 55 countries across the world and the company is continuing to grow at a very rapid rate.
The Form 1, $2,945,885 of $100,000 goal
Formlabs’ beautiful high-resolution desktop stereolithographic printer caught the attention of over 2,000 backers, unfortunately it also caught the attention of 3D Systems.
Launched in September 2012 The Form 1 was fully funded within two and half hours, within two and half days they’d hit 1,000%. By the end of the funding period they’d received 2,945% funding and again Bre Petis was one of those many backers.
Those initial highs were followed pretty quickly with a low, on November 20th 3D Systems filed a law suit for IP theft against Formlabs AND Kickstarter, "3D Systems believes the Form 1 3D printer infringes at least one of our patents, and we intend to enforce our patent rights."
Despite the impending lawsuit Formlabs are forging ahead, The Form 1 printer is now in full production and is available to pre-order for £3,299, shipping in May this year.
RoBo 3D printer $649,663 of $49,000 goal
Fighting out of San Diego, California RoBo 3D was formed by a group of three friends, two engineers and a marketeer. Aiming to be an open source, ultra affordable 3D printer the three amigos started their Kickstarter campaign in December and the funding project only ended two weeks ago.
Within five days of launch the project was already fully funded and the backers continued to pour in, eventually leaving the group with 1325% of funding. RoBo 3D have now received their first shipment of parts and are still aiming to hit their delivery estimates for their backers.
To pre-order the RoBo 3D now would set you back $599 had you have backed the boys on Kickstarter you could have got you hands on one for $520.
Pandarobotics of Toronto, Canada launched their Kickstarter campaign on October 4th, 2012 looking to emulate the success of Formlabs with the cutesy design and usability of their PandaBot 3D printer.
Just 22 days into the campaign, funding levels ticking along nicely with just 20% left to raise, PandaBot unexpectedly pulled the plug and funding was cancelled.
Stating that they didn’t want their backers to pay more for a beta product than they would for the finished article they offered some compensation in the way of a Panda Robotics t-shirt and a Panda Robotics sticker, plus a $200 coupon that can be applied towards a PandaBot.
Whether those backers will ever have a chance to use that coupon is anybody’s guess.
Tell us your favourite Kickstarter campaigns….
