From January 5-8 2017 the CES (Consumer Electronics Show) will hit Las Vegas, over three locations from Westgate Las Vegas (Tech East) to The Palazzo (Tech West) and the Cosmopolitan (Tech South). 2017 will mark 50 years of CES, seeing 10 companies from the first show in 1967 achieving special recognition for their contribution to the show. As one of the biggest electronics shows in America, CES is split into many different events, but the spotlight for 3D printing is being put on the CES 2017 Innovation Awards.
Four companies are honorees of the Innovation Awards 3D printing category. The 3D printers selected are; the Rize One from Rize Inc., MoonRay v. 2 from SprintRay, the ZEUS Infinity from AIO Robotics, Inc. and the Robo R2 from Robo 3D – which has achieved the Best Of Innovation for its category. The company were recently acquired by Falcon Minerals (ASX:FCN).
How was it judged?
Although not all machines are available to the public yet each 3D printer was apparently individually scored by a panel of judges in how they met each of 5 criteria:
- Engineering qualities
- Aesthetic and design qualities
- The product’s intended use/function and user value. For Tech for a Better World entries, this also includes how it can make a positive impact to the quality of life for its users, or those affected by its use
- Why the product deserves the Innovation Award, including specifics regarding its unique/novel features and features that consumers would find attractive
- How the design and innovation of this product directly compare to other products in the marketplace
(Judging criteria taken from the CES website)
The scores were then combined, with the winner being the one achieving the highest overall score. Speaking on their success, Braydon Moreno, co-founder of Robo 3D, says:
“We’re honored to be recognized for our new product design and engineering in 3D printing by this prestigious awards program. The Robo R2 is geared for high-performance 3D printing and a range of multi-functional uses. And we’re proud to be the first to market with a machine that offers cutting-edge features at consumer-level price points.”
Fully integrated app to print experience
It appears that it is Robo 3D’s specially designed app that won the Robo R2 its award, with a Beta version being available to download on sign-up to their website. Of the other honourees, Rize One was selected for being a ‘zero post-processing’ 3D printer – which 3DPI had the pleasure of previewing in September the Michael Petch interviewed Rize CEO Frank Marangell. Likewise, the Moon-Ray was awarded for its ‘all-in-one UV DLP’ approach. Neither offer anything that hasn’t really been seen before on the market. However, the ZEUS Infinity promises continuous 3D printing without the need for a robot arm, and on-board scanning of an object. With such bold claims, we would be interested to see how the ZEUS Infinity performs. This is the first we’ve heard from AIO Robotics since it entered the Chinese market 6 months ago with market leaders Shenyang Machine Tool Co., Ltd. (SHE:000410).
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Featured image shows the Top Tech stag trophy awarded to Digital Trends in 2016. Image via: digitaltrends.com/ces/
