Whoever has seen, whoever knows... Where is Nexa3D?
The Atomic Layers: S4E19 (00105)
Atomic Layer of the Day:
The first day of Formnext is behind us. I walked over 20 km, touring (multiple times) all the halls. For me—someone who has been writing about the 3D printing industry daily for 12 years—some things seemed "interesting," but the rest was just "ok..." Nice but not groundbreaking. Unfortunately, this is the kind of feeling that creeps up on those who have been observing this business day in and day out for over a decade.
But for me personally, the biggest news of the first day wasn't what I saw—it was what I couldn't see. Nexa3D. It was supposed to be there. It wasn't. And there's a deeper story behind this...
Over the past few weeks, I received a few pieces of information from two sources about serious issues at Nexa3D. Without wanting to disclose them or delve into details (some of which were quite blunt), I can summarize it as follows:
There's no money.
Hardly anyone is left.
Nobody wants to take it over (despite many attempts).
I was very curious to see how this would play out at Formnext. Nexa3D was supposed to be there—in Hall 11.1, booth E31. VoxelMatters had a meeting scheduled, which I was supposed to attend. On Saturday (November 16), while preparing, I checked the trade fair website and noted down the hall and booth numbers.
Today, 20 minutes before the meeting, I went to check out the booth and... I couldn’t find it. I thought I had made a mistake writing down the numbers from the Formnext website, so I went to the trade fair information desk. It turned out that there was no such company as Nexa3D at the fair. It had vanished.
What does this mean? It could mean many things, but I think you can guess what it likely implies...
However, my good friend told me that he saw Nexa3D CEO walking through fair (you also know who I’m talking about…).
Atomic Layer from the Past:
11-19-2019: GE Additive (now Colibrium Additive) unveiled the Arcam EBM Spectra L.
News & Gossips:
Prusa unveiled a new 3D printer! It looks stunning! It's a CoreXY! Well done, Josef! But "word on the Formnext street" is that it’s a big disappointment. Prusa essentially created its own version of the Bambu Lab printer—just significantly more expensive. Personally, I don’t even see it as a copy of Bambu Lab but rather of the highly underrated Rat Rig. What more can I say? Ultimaker and MakerBot once went down a similar path.
Speaking of UltiMaker, they have a small section of the iGO3D booth—much smaller, in fact.
And if you visit the Nano Dimension booth, it will take you quite some time to find the Desktop Metal section. And not because the Nano Dimension booth is that large. By comparison, Markforged has its own independent booth and makes a big, solid impression.