XYZPrinting (da Vinci 3D printers) ceasing operations

This information has been circulating in the 3D printing industry for about two-three months now, so it’s time to make it permanent. XYZPrinting – one of the main and most popular manufacturers of 3D printers in the world, is closing down. In March this year, the company’s shareholders – New Kinpo Group and Calcomp, decided to release Nexa3D the industrial division of SLS 3D printers and the remaining operating element – Desktop, OEM and Materials. The process of closing the company at the end of the year actually seems to be final at this moment…

Information as the first confirmation of Fernando Hernandez – Managing Director of the company for Europe, who described the decision behind the scenes in his LinkedIn article published at the end of March 2023. Hernandez explains it with the market trend for desktop 3D printers after the C19 failure, while noting that the sale of the SLS department to Nexa3D was “another strategic business move” referring to “current global supply and production constraints”. The source of the highest origin, TCT Magazine confirmed with a XYZprinting spokesperson who said “what Fernando mentioned is almost identical. There is a change in the strategy of parent companies and major shareholders. It was prepared for a short while.”

The Taiwanese company XYZ Printing was established in 2013 by Kinpo Electronics and Cal-Comp Electronics – a company belonging to the Asian electronics tycoon Kinpo Group, one of the main manufacturers in Southeast Asia. From the very first day, it promised two revolutions – the creation of a new generation of desktop 3D printers improved for usability and offered at an incredibly good price of USD 499. Its plans were extremely ambitious – in the first press release, it was announced the sale of 1 million devices in the next three years of operation. To put it all in right perspective – other popular desktop-class 3D printers like MakerBot or Ultimaker cost at that time over USD 2000 and sold tens of thousands of units per year.

We do not know whether the Taiwanese company’s commercial goal was achieved – but we do know that for some time XYZPrinting had the widest portfolio of 3D printers on the market, releasing iconic (although it does not mean “high-end” …) models such as da Vinci Junior, da Vinci PRO, Noble (SLA photopolymer 3D printer), or the first commercial FDM / FFF 3D printer printing in full color – da Vinci Full Color. In 2015-2018, the company dominated the segment of home (consumer) and educational 3D printers, offering ease of use, compactness and unique design.

On the other hand – in terms of the quality of work, the devices were “solid” at best, and the proprietary XYZWare software was a bit crude compared to competing solutions. Also, self-service of 3D printers was quite a challenge – certain construction solutions and access to key elements (such as the extruder) could certainly have been designed differently. In the case of the da Vinci PRO 1 model, it was also worth noting, for example, that the size of the device itself was disproportionate to the working area it offered.

In 2019, XYZprinting launched an industrial 3D printing department, creating proprietary SLS machines that print from gypsum powders. This led the company to significant growth, but at the same time, the situation in the desktop 3D printer market was affecting the existing channel and limiting resources for further growth in the future. Then came the C19 pandemic, global supply chains collapsed, and the sector of cheap FDM / FFF and UV LCD 3D printers was dominated by Chinese manufacturers, led by Creality3D and Anycubic, and the Czech PRUSA Research. All this combined led to the accumulation of problems and, as a last resort, the owners of XYZPrinitng decided to extinguish this activity and sell more valuable assets.

It is also worth bearing in mind that despite the relatively large scale of the company’s operations in the 3D printing sector, in terms of the entire Kinpo Group business, it was still only a small, side project… This is not the first case of this type – in 2018 Canon came out of 3D printing, even though its 3D printing division was doing quite well compared to the overall market.

The closure of XYZPrinting is, in its own way, the end of an era where aesthetic and colorful 3D printers tried unsuccessfully to conquer the consumer market. The Taiwanese company eventually followed the same path as numerous and now forgotten startups (Solidoodle, Micro, Buccaneer) or the departments of consumer 3D printers of companies such as 3D Systems (Cube) and MakerBot Industries. Home users made a different choice, focusing on open constructions, under the Ender 3 and Prusa Mini banners.

Source: www.linkedin.com