Lani, a Velocity backed 3D printing startup, built an industry changing platform that optimizes the 3D printing process to merely 3 steps.
Lani is a payment and management system for 3D Print Centers that enables universities, public libraries and partnering 3D Print Centres to automate payment, manage users, designs and materials, allowing everyone and anyone the opportunity to access a 3D printer in their area. The company aims to alleviate the pains of owning your own printer, slicing your models, keeping track of print settings, and much more. They make it as simple as uploading your design to the lani website, picking your printer options (filament, type of printer, etc.), and pressing print.
Lani’s newly built online platform has a sleek design and intuitive user interface that will allow users to seamlessly navigate and operate. The platform’s structure was built with the company’s mission in mind “Bringing 3D printing to mainstream and make it insanely easy for people to use 3D Printers”.
Curious to see just how user friendly the interface was, I went through the process online, and it is indeed incredibly simple to navigate. You literally just upload a file and select the printer and filament and it gives you a price.
“I wanted to build a system where anyone, anywhere can submit a design very quickly without much problem,” says lani CEO Pablo Eder. “I think people should focus on learning how to design a 3D model, but not really on the settings of the printer. You should be able to just hit ‘print.’”
Pablo believes that 3D printing will be the next norm. With an industry annual growth at 40% and the Chinese government committing to put 3D Printers in all 400,000 elementary schools by next year, 3D printing is on the constant rise.
lanibox
If you are a 3D printer owner and would like to be able to print for others, all you need is a lanibox. It is a hardware router that controls the printers via USB, and allows you to have full control over your printers with any device and be able to monitor all your jobs. It can be controlled via phone, tablet or computer, and allows you to start, restart, pause, resume and stop print jobs. You put in the printing preferences you want to offer customers (printer model, materials, etc), and the lanibox stores these preferences.
Using the software on the lani labs website, printer owners can track jobs and choose whether to accept or reject them. It’s that simple.
About Lani Inc.
Lani Inc. is a Waterloo-based startup that wants to revolutionize the 3D printing space with its automation and management platform. Lani wants to be the company that breaks the barriers within the realm of 3D printing. They hope to bring 3D printing to mainstream, allowing anyone to access and effortlessly use 3D printers.
