The Times are Changing: 3D Printing and Manufacturing Processes

In reference to Erik Brynjolffson’s TED Talks presentation, where he illustrates productivity revolutions through new arrivals in General Purpose Technology, I’m beginning to wonder if the 3D printer might be that next technological revolution. As a personal, $1,000 retail version of a metal 3D printer is in development, 3D printers are already being identified as an incredibly powerful and worthwhile piece of research and development.  Following the computer that came before it, potential drastic decreases in price, combined with simultaneous exponential advances in speed and power might be the future path for 3D printers – to the point where it potentially becomes a common household item. In a more important sense, however, 3D printing offers a much larger potential disruption to manufacturing processes. Firms are already being pressed by the threat of losing out to lower-cost manufacturing processes from competitors working to utilize 3D printing, similar to Netflix adapting to the online media trend, while Blockbuster suffered an ill-fate. But which industries need to be concerned? Jewellery manufacturers may find a lower-cost production process for their products, for example, and weapon manufacturers could find weapon modelling and prototyping to be a completely different process. If this is, in fact, a technological transition period for manufacturing industries, how, as a potentially affected business, do you assess the need to change, if at all?

Image: The intricate possibilities of 3D printing, shown through a miniature urban diorama