A report from Additive Manufacturing Research quantified the size of the 3D print market, and there’s some interesting implications.
The company produces periodic research reports on the Additive Manufacturing industry, and one of the key reports focuses on the total revenue generated by the industry.
In the latest report it is reported that the market activity for 2Q24 was US$3.45B, slightly less than 1Q24. This quarter was 8.4% larger than 2Q23, demonstrating there is growth in the industry.
They also reported the following:
- Metal AM: US$1.40B, 10% growth
- Polymer AM: US$2.05B, 7.4% growth
- AM Services: US$1.87B (included in the two above). 12% growth
This is the interesting part: the market is still growing, in spite of incredible doom and gloom in the media.
As we’ve seen in our weekly leaderboard where we track the valuations of publicly traded 3D print companies, many companies have seen their value collapse in the past two years.
At first glance this does seem quite catastrophic, and it definitely is for specific companies. Several firms have lost literally 90%+ of their prior values, and some have even disappeared from the market, either bankrupt or bought out.
How could so many companies lose value in a market that is apparently growing?
There’s only one answer: these companies were highly overvalued by investors. While the market is indeed growing as per the Additive Manufacturing Research report, the value of that market is less than what investors apparently believed it would be.
For these overcapitalized companies this is a very serious issue. However, many other AM companies, particularly those without public investment, seem to be doing reasonably well.
The problem here is that the most visible companies in the space are those that are publicly traded — and they were overvalued. Because of this the media buzz is quite negative on the technology.
That’s bad not only for the overvalued companies that now cannot find new investors to help them through the darkness, but also for new startups and growing AM companies that are doing well that actually need investment.
The outrageous investments of some publicly traded companies might have made a few individuals quite wealthy, but there has been considerable damage to the industry’s reputation. That will affect the progress of 3D printing for quite some time.
