BCN3D Rises with $3M Raised

Barcelona-based desktop 3D printer manufacturer BCN3D has announced a $3 million funding.

Not only has the open source company raised significant funding, it also now officially stands alone. The influx of capital — which the company says “turns BCN3D into one of the top 10 desktop 3D printing manufacturers in Europe by funding” — has now enabled BCN3D to fully spin off from CIM-UPC Center.

The company’s deep roots in the large polytechnic university have been an enduring part of its legacy. Indeed, much of the staff is sourced right from the university; I felt rather old when, leaving a conference in Barcelona last year, I stopped to visit the company on the way to the airport. It’s an impressive facility with a youthful and energetic team. And that energy is carrying them forward.

BCN3D recently announced that it has hit a milestone, selling 5,000 machines globally. Now it’s set to ramp up even further.

VC firms contributing to the $3M seed funding round include Accurafy4, JME VC, and VICTORIA.

“With this funding, we will be able to ramp-up our production to meet the market demand and cut down the long delivery periods we have experienced in the past due to production limitation,” said BCN3D CEO Xavier Martínez Faneca.

The company is, he says, working to expand its portfolio. The forthcoming “new range of products” will be based on BCN3D’s Independent Dual EXtruder (IDEX) technology, which will be taken “to a completely new level,” as Faneca says. With the IDEX setup, the two extruders move separately from one another, enabling interesting new possibilities at the desktop level like the still relatively unusual ‘mirror mode.’

BCN3D counts among its clients some pretty big names in a variety of industries. It’s like a weird (to non-3D printing folk, at least) riddle: What do NASA, BMW, Louis Vuitton, and Samsung have in common? They’re all BCN3D customers.

Similarly impressive is that list of VCs, each of which noted in the announcement their enthusiasm to work with BCN3D.

“BCN3D is one of the largest spin-off from an engineering university we have seen in Spain and one of the largest in Europe. They have a breakthrough technology – IDEX – that only the best spin-offs have, plus a degree of commercial traction that most spin-offs need years to accomplish and that they’ve already got before day 1. We are thrilled to be part of the company and are fully committed to helping the team accomplish their future goal,” said Abel Conill, General Partner at VICTORIA Venture Capital.

An interesting point about that ‘day 1’ is that while BCN3D traces its roots back to 2012, it’s still officially a young company with the spin off from CIM-UPC. Today, it’s a new company. Just one with great experience born of this seven-year incubation period as a university group.

Co-founders of the new BCN3D include CEO Faneca as well as executive team Roger Antunez, Pol Domenech, Marc Felis, Jose Antonio Ortega, Eric Pallares, and technology advisor (and former CEO) Roger Ucenda.

Via BCN3D