Didn’t win an Oscar this weekend? Never mind, the 2019 3D Printing Awards is coming on June 6th, celebrating the greatest achievements in additive manufacturing over the past year.
Nominations for this year’s 3D Printing Industry Awards close March 1, 2019, so there’s only a few days left to share your contributions before we share the shortlists for a public vote. If you have a company, individual, application, hardware, software or material you believe deserves an award, make your nominations now before its too late.
So far we have given our readers updates on the nominees for the 3D printing hardware and materials categories for 2019. Now it’s time to complete the trifecta and share some of the companies in the running for 3D Printing Software Application of the Year.
For the past two years, American multinational software company Autodesk has taken home this award, both for its Netfabb platform and for Fusion 360. This year however, nominations are more varied than ever, so there’s plenty of competition vying to knock this competitor off the top spot. In addition to CAD and scan-to-CAD software applications, this year nominees include MES, quality control platforms, topology optimization and, of course, a host of slicers. Read on to find out who’s currently in with a chance of being named this year’s winner.
3D printing CAD software of the year?
Could it be a CAD platform that takes home this year’s trophy? So far, Autodesk alone has received several nominations, one for Netfabb Ultimate – the company’s most advanced Netfabb version – and a second for Tinkercad, tipped to be the “Easiest 3D Design and 3D modeling platform online.”
3D Systems‘ Geomagic FreeForm, a design to manufacturing application featuring touch-based 3D sculpting, has also received nominations.
Now a part of Massachusetts software company PTC Frustum, a contender for last year’s Start-up of the Year, and its TRUESOLID generative design software is listed in the 2019 Software Application of the Year category. New York’s nTopology, that also provides generative design capabilities within its Element Pro product, has been nominated for both its software offerings – the nTop Platform engineering software and Element latticing tool.
3D file optimization tools
Building on the stalwart CAD platform, a number of file editing extensions have also been named as contenders for the 2019 Software Application of the Year.
Among those mentioned are 3D Systems’ 3D Sprint software, made specially for editing files destined for polymer processing. Stratasys subsidiary GrabCAD has also received nominations for its Advanced FDM tool.
There’s Cubicure .stl editor CSS, as well as Finite Element Analysis (FEA) integration for lattice design in Carbon’s 3D print software in this category too.
Quality control for additive manufacturing
A crucial part of all 3D printing for production, there are a number of software solutions designed to manage quality control.
The IRISS controlled loop system for Sciaky’s EBAM 3D printers is just one example of integrated software capable of monitoring and correcting a process when printing.
Specially designed for aerospace applications, the AeroDNA sofware from UK-headquartered Valuechain is also nominated for 2019 Software Application of the Year.
In addition, quality control is the primary objective of software provided by Israeli startup LEO Lane.
Scan-to-CAD file solutions
Returning to the nominations after 2017’s win, Autodesk has also received nominations for its Fusion 360 scan-to-CAD application.
Other specialist programs with this functionality include 3D Systems’ Geomagic software, and Meshroom open source photogrammetry software from Alice Vision.
Best slicer of the year?
Almost deserving of a category of its own, there have been a lot of slicer nominations for the 2019 3D Software Application of the Year.
To mention a few of the top picks by our readers, there is: Ultimaker Cura, Slic3r Prusa Edition, Simplify3D and B9 Creation’s B9Captivate.
Other 3D software solutions
A number of the nominations received have also been machine-specific operating software. This includes Emerging Object’s Potterware software for 3D printing ceramics, Markforged Eiger, and the Voladd Cloud.
Outside of this, the Link3D Manufacturing Execution System (MES) software, which was recently integrated by EOS North America, has been nominated, as has the AM Part Identifier (AMPI) from 3YOURMIND.
If you’re a company looking to get involved in the 2019 3D Printing Industry Awards it’s time to start sharing this nomination with your network. As for our readers – if there’s anything missing from the list above, now’s your chance to get your voice heard:
Make your nominations for the 2019 3D Printing Industry Awards now. Voting opens in March.
For further awards updates and ideas for who to nominate this year, subscribe to the 3D Printing Industry newsletter, follow us on Facebook and like us on Twitter. Seeking 3D Printing Jobs? Join and advertise on our dedicated site now to reach professionals in this industry.
Featured image shows Sruthi Venkatest’s winning 3D Printing Industry Awards 2018 trophy design, made by Protolabs.
