Eliminating the bottleneck for mass adoption

The Niche

While we sing much praise to the glorious 3D printing technology in this blog, the current technology has one central flaw: It's too slow.
If we look at the current applications where 3D printing is most successful in - like prototyping (as nicely illustrated in this case study), organ printing or creating confectionary - it becomes evident that most of these fields have one central feature in common: They require customization. Traditionally customized items are expected to not be churned out of a machine within minutes and by the hundreds. Speed is not of the essence there (though a cake should of course not take a day to be printed).

A woman with a 3D printed version of herself (source)

The wishful revolution

Many people see 3D printing as THE technology to usher in another industrial revolution (as not only this author claims, but also the Guardian and the Economist). Big words that are easily flung onto paper and blogs - however a driver of change of the magnitude the industrial revolutions brought, is supposedly either bringing significant cost-cuts in production or increases productivity -  which during the first industrialization was achieved by a magnitude of a hundred to a thousand (Ayres, p.17).

Machine Hall of the German Engineer Hartmann, a pioneer in the industrialisation of Germany (source)

And this is exactly what 3D printing technology in its current state is unable to provide. As long as 3D printers take hours to produce a simple 2x2 inch object, they will never be able to replace any serious production capability beyond the creation of simple customized objects who's production is not time-sensitive. Mass-production is simply impossible.

From one to many

As soon as the speed of 3D printing increases however, we will experience rapid mass adoption and might indeed see a transformation of our entire economy and society. Because then the high levels of customization and the cut of logistical costs (besides the raw material) combined with the ability to speedily (mass-)produce will be an inescapable advantage for everyone who possess it.

Batch produced small pigs to demonstrate the capabilities of 3D printers for mass production (source)

And we are not that far away from it. The single biggest bottleneck for making 3D printing big might be history soon. And with it our old forms of manufacturing.
Will the next industrial revolution big soon?