If you were an athlete who ran races for a living, imagine what it would be like to be able to run four times faster than your toughest competitors. Then imagine being 100 times faster. That kind of speed is just one of the advantages — real, not imagined — of Desktop Metal, a Koch partner that makes it possible to print complex, three-dimensional parts and shapes out of stainless steel and other metals.
“Compared to our closest competition, we’re four or five times faster,” said Jonah Myerberg, a co-founder of Desktop Metal. “And compared to more common laser-based printing systems, we’re 100 times faster. That kind of speed enables us to produce prototype parts for our customers in hours or days rather than weeks or months.”
Although Desktop Metal did not invent metal printing, Myerberg pointed out that he and his partners saw an opportunity because the original technology was never fast enough to be cost-effective. “We transformed that aspect of additive manufacturing.” Where other units might need a full day to make a dozen copies of a common part, such as an impeller, a Desktop Metal unit can produce 560 in the same amount of time. “That brings the cost per unit way down and makes the time to market much faster.”