Scott Crump, Chairman of the Board of Stratasys, and Bre Pettis, CEO of MakerBot, kicked off the Inside 3D Printing conference in Chicago this morning with an exciting vision of a future where 3D printing becomes a part of our daily life.
It all began in the late 80s, when Scott Crump wanted to make a toy frog for his daughter. Scott and his wife Lisa built the frog, and with it the first 3D printer, with little more than a glue gun and a toy plotter in their kitchen. A passion was born, and after the food started tasting like plastic, they moved the operation to the garage. In 1989, they patented the first FDM (fused deposition modeling) machine, or 3D printer. Today Scott Crump is Chairman of the Board and Chief Innovation Officer of Stratasys, the largest commercial 3D printer company in the world. With over 30,000 printers sold, Stratasys has a global presence and annual revenues of over $350 million. They currently produce over fifty five percent of the commercial 3D printers in the market.
…Crump then introduced Bre Pettis, the co-founder and CEO of MakerBot, who spoke about his journey into the 3D printing world that has made these printers accessible to consumers. He mentioned that he and his co-founders Adam and Zach began playing with the idea of 3D printing in 2007 at the hacker space, NYC Resistor. By January 2009, they founded MakerBot, which has recently been acquired by Stratasys for $403 million. Much like Scott and Lisa Crump started in their kitchen, Pettis mentioned how they “started as three guys, a laser cutter and a dream.”
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