Wohlers Report 1999

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Rapid Prototyping & Tooling State of the Industry Year 1999 Annual Worldwide Progress Report

28

Charts

21

Tables

54

Photographs and Illustrations

Rapid Prototyping & Tooling State of the Industry: 1999 Worldwide Progress Report. Wohlers Associates has established a tradition of providing high-quality analyses that cover all facets of RP including business, product, market, technology, and applications.

Table of Contents
Faqs

Acknowledgments
About the author
Focus of this report
Introduction to rapid prototyping and tooling

PART 1: BACKGROUND

History of RP systems
Industries being served
- How RP models are being used
- Installations by country
Applications
- Communication
- Engineering changes
- Good ideas and powerful proposals
- Concept models
- Early input from suppliers, toolmakers
- Prototypes and prototype tooling
- Metal castings
- Verifying CAD databases
- Styling, ergonomic studies
- Requesting quotes
- Packaging and shipping
- Critical to function

PART 2: INDUSTRY

A challenging time
Revenue growth
- Secondary market
- Revenues from products and services
- Revenues from service bureaus
- Other service revenues
Unit sales
- Stratasys regains the lead
- Systems sold by region in 1998
- Cumulative systems sold by region
- Units sold by U.S. manufacturers in 1998
- Units sold by Japanese manufacturers in 1998
- 1998 unit sales by manufacturer
- Cumulative unit sales by manufacturer
- Unit sales by vendor and year
Growth trends and sales forecasts
- Unit sales growth percentages
- Worldwide revenue estimates
- Annual revenue growth percentages
- Comparing growth of RP and machining markets
Service bureaus
- Concentration of service bureaus
- Mix of machines
- Shrinking market
- Investment casting patterns
- Working with service bureaus
- Times have changed
- What is driving prices downward?
- More challenges are ahead
- Market saturation
- Plynetics Express: What went wrong?

PART 3: TOOLING

Advanced approaches
Indirect approaches to tooling
- Silicone rubber tooling
- Aluminum-filled epoxy tooling
- Spray metal tooling
- RSP Tooling
- Sprayform
- Metal spray tooling from DTI
- Cast kirksite tooling
- 3D Keltool
- Dynamic Tooling
- ECOTOOL
- ExpressTool
- CEMCOM
- PHAST
Direct approaches to tooling
- Direct AIM tooling
- SLS RapidTool
- DMLS from EOS
- ExtrudeHone
- LENS
Other considerations
- Machined tooling
- Space Puzzle Molding
- Prototype tooling selection guide
- Size of tooling market

PART 4: SYSTEM MANUFACTURERS

3D Systems
- SLA-7000
- ThermoJet
- 3D Keltool
Aaroflex
Beijing Yinhua
Cubital
DTM
- RapidTool
- Growing list of materials
EOS
- DirectTool products
- Micro shot peening
Fockele & Schwarze
Helisys
Kinergy
Optomec
Sanders Prototype
- New management
- Developing technology
Schroff Development
- Operating costs
- Customers
Stratasys
- Genisys Xs
- Throughput
Z Corp.
- Speed
- Materials
Casualties
RP stocks
- Disappointing earnings
- Global economy
- Small cap stocks out of favor

PART 5: JAPAN & EUROPE

Japan
- Markets embracing RP
- Unit sales growth
- Japanese strategy
- Developments and trends in Japan
- New RP system that uses LEDs
- Why has RP growth been slow?
- Tooling and high-speed machining in Japan
Europe
- EU support
- United Kingdom
- Germany
- Fraunhofer activities
- France
- Scandinavia
- The Netherlands
Other regions
- South Africa
- Canada
- RP groups and associations

PART 6: RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT

Development of system technology
- MicroTEC
- Directed Light Fabrication
- Controlled Metal Buildup
- Multi Jet Solidification
- Topographic Shell Fabrication
- MIT
- Offset Fabrication
- Micromod
- University of Utah
U.S. government-sponsored R&D
- NSF funding
- DoD
RP academic programs
- Hurdles and hindrances
- Research activities
- Beyond 2000

PART 7: CAD & COMPUTING

CAD/CAM/CAE
- Advances in computing
- Operating systems
- Open systems
- Growth of solid modeling
- Interoperability and data translation
- Product data management
- Machining STL data
Software for RP
- SolidView
- Magics, Mimics
- View Expert, 3Data Expert
- 3D View
- Rapid Prototyping Module
- Velocity2
The Internet
- Next day models
- 3DQ Concepts
- Caught by surprise

PART 8: OTHER DEVELOPMENTS

RP materials
- Stereolithography resins
- Materials for other RP processes
- 3D printers
Medical modeling
- Research areas in medical RP
- RP is impacting the lives of patients
Reverse engineering
- How the technology works
- Laser digitizing systems
- What works, what doesn’t
- Other advice

PART 9: WHERE IT’S ALL HEADED

Caught in the chasm
- Technology adoption life cycle
- CAD solid modeling as a gating factor
- RP’s past
- RP’s present state
- What needs to happen
- RP’s future
What to do
- Risks and land mines
- 3D printing
- Rapid manufacturing
- Changes ahead
- Will digital models replace physical prototypes?
- Long-term outlook
The future
- Systems of the future
- Future applications
Where to learn more
- Internet mail list
- RPA/SME

APPENDICES

Appendix A: Glossary of terms
Appendix B: Addresses of RP system manufacturers
- United States
- Israel
- Europe
- Japan
- Singapore
- China
Appendix C: Rapid tooling technology developers
Appendix D: RP software companies
Appendix E: Material suppliers
Appendix F: U.S. RP systems
Appendix G: RP systems manufactured outside the U.S.
Appendix H: Materials
Appendix I: 3D digitizing systems

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Can I share the digital version of the report with people in my organization?

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Digital Version

Product Type: Publications,
Publication Date(s): 1999
Pages: 200

What Others are Saying

“Very easy to read. It gave me just what I was looking for.”
Douglas Freitag, Bayside Materials Technology

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Joe Greco, Desktop Engineering Magazine

“It is very comprehensive, well organized, and well written. We will be pouring over the details for some time to come.”
Mike Rynerson, ExtrudeHone

“The section on rapid tooling is particularly interesting. Wohlers systematically looks at all the competing technologies on the market today and provides detailed information on how to best apply each of them.”
Engineering Automation Report

“As always, you have done a spectacular job collecting information from around the world on our ever-changing industry. I commend you on the depth and breadth of your labors.”
Marina Hatsopoulos, Z Corp.

“It’s my owner’s manual to the RP industry.”
Todd Grimm, Accelerated Technologies, Inc.

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