Ten minutes. That was how long it took for Pirate3D, a Singapore-based startup, to smash the USD 100K fundraising goal on Kickstarter for The Buccaneer, their first ever 3D printer. The product has impressed geeks with its Apple-like sleekness and low price point of USD 347.
Unlike other 3D printers on the market at the sub-USD1,000 category, The Buccaneer is designed to be consumer-friendly and easy to set up. It’s not just a hardware product: The printer will be shipped together with Smart Objects, a mobile and PC app that enables anyone to craft complex shapes and send the design for instant manufacture — no knowledge of 3D software needed.
By 3 June, 11am Singapore time, the project has already received a pledge of USD 500k from 1,310 backers. The company aims to ship their first batch of printers by Christmas.
Check out their campaign page on Kickstarter, and also read SGE’s story on how Pirate3D is able to sell their printers at such an affordable price.
The Buccaneer and the Power Mac G4 Cube. The resemblance isn’t coincidental.
There hasn’t been a pre-launch product from a Singapore startup that has garnered this much press attention for a long while. Simply put, people are agog about the USD 347 price point for an Apple-esque 3D printer that will be pre-assembled and calibrated right out of the box. In fact, some have been downright skeptical, believing the photos to be renders rather than real images.
But there’s no two ways about it: The Buccaneer – which is what the first product from Pirate3D is called — is going to arrive in homes in the United States and around the world. In fact, the company is prepping a Kickstarter campaign that will hopefully launch in the next few days — and they’re working with the crowdfunding platform to provide as much details as possible. I’ve even seen a prototype in action myself at the coworking space the Singapore-based team is working out of.
Of the myriad of 3D printers in the market, there has been quite a number in the sub-$1000 category: RepRap, Printrbot, Solidoodle, and Makibox, just to name a few. Read more
The founders of Pirate3DP wants to make the 3D printer affordable for the masses. L-R: Tsang You Jun, Brendan Goh and Roger Chang
Tech prophets like Chris Anderson have proclaimed that we are on a cusp of a maker revolution — where affordable, mass market 3D printers would soon land in the homes of you and I, allow consumers to create objects at home instead of purchasing them at a shop.
While I’m not sure if it will happen, Red Dot Ventures, a Singapore-based seed and early stage fund, is betting on it. The TIS incubator has sunk SGD 589K (USD482K) into Pirate3DP, a Singapore startup that aims to commercialize and build a 3D printer for the masses.
“The draw of this technology is that now everyone can make anything, right in his living room,” said Leslie Loh, managing director of Red Dot Ventures, “3D printing is going to make a dent in the universe, and we are happy to support a local startup and be part in this technology revolution.” Read more
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