04-29-2015, 01:04 PM
In my opinion these stocks are speculative, and should be approached as such. I knew 3D printing stocks were in a bubble a year or two ago when I started hearing people talking on the radio about how home printing was going to replace central manufacturing, everyone would be printing their own replacement car parts, etc. Since then the stocks have crashed, but I'm still not interested.
I have a friend with a Makerbot and it's good at printing custom designed plastic parts the color of the feedstock and with a visible grain from the direction of the feed. I do believe it is a good technology for hobbyists and prototyping, and possibly for flexible manufacturing of non-critical parts. I don't believe that we'll ever be printing brake rotors or electromechanical devices, anything that has to be tested, listed, approved or warrantied, or requires specialized manufacturing processes for tight QC and/or safety and reliability standards. But no matter what you believe about 3D printing, the stocks are still valued on a promise of what might happen in the future.
I have a friend with a Makerbot and it's good at printing custom designed plastic parts the color of the feedstock and with a visible grain from the direction of the feed. I do believe it is a good technology for hobbyists and prototyping, and possibly for flexible manufacturing of non-critical parts. I don't believe that we'll ever be printing brake rotors or electromechanical devices, anything that has to be tested, listed, approved or warrantied, or requires specialized manufacturing processes for tight QC and/or safety and reliability standards. But no matter what you believe about 3D printing, the stocks are still valued on a promise of what might happen in the future.