August 2013
The Licensing Journal
By John F. Hornick; Daniel F. Roland
Authored by John F. Hornick and Daniel F. Roland
3D printing is a disruptive technology with far-reaching implications for manufacturers, consumers, and intellectual property owners. As observers of this industry have said, 3D printing today is an overnight success story that has been 30 years in the making. Used only industrially and academically since the 1980s, 3D printers are now used by industry and consumers alike. In April 2012, The Economist dubbed 3D printing the "third industrial revolution."1In his 2013 State of the Union address, President Obama acknowledged the technologies' potential.23D printers eventually can be used to make anything, and even though 3D printing remains fairly primitive in some areas, the technology has evolved to the point that 3D printers are beginning to infiltrate homes and enter the mainstream. 3D printing has the capacity to change everything.
3D printing, also known as additive manufacturing, turns a computer-aided design (CAD) file created on a computer or with a 3D scanner into a physical object, allowing users to make almost anything.3Unlike traditional manufacturing, which uses subtractive processes, such as grinding, forging, drilling, and cutting, 3D printing is an additive process.4There are many 3D printing processes, but they all fuse materials, layer on layer, with heat, chemicals, light, electron beams, or glue. 3D printers generally work in one of two ways: (1) extruding a material through one or more tiny nozzles onto a build area or (2) selectively fusing a bed of powdered or sheet material, one layer at a time.5 Some postproduction work often is required after printing, such as sintering or heat treating to achieve a desired strength or hardness, sanding or polishing to achieve a desired surface texture, or cleaning excess powder.6Because products can be printed with thin interior walls, they sometimes need support structures to brace the walls while being printed. The support structures need to be removed, and they can be dissolved or cut away after printing is complete.7
A growing range of printable feedstock (sometimes called "inks") exists today, including ordinary and not-so-ordinary materials. Most 3D printed products are made of either ABS or PLA thermoplastic, but some companies are making 3D printers that print with metal.8Other materials can be printed with more advanced machines, such as ceramics, sand, glass, and even human tissue.9Others are printing hybrid materials. For example, Washington State University has developed a bone-like material that provides support for bone growth.10The University of Glasgow is printing organic compounds and inorganic clusters to be used for customized medicine delivery.11Such a development would greatly affect the pharmaceutical industry and the way it delivers product. Other researchers are printing in extremely small sizes (microns and nanometers), such as Harvard's and the University of Illinois' printing of microbatteries roughly the size of a grain of sand.12Hybrid inks are being developed to make it possible for products to have combinations of physical, mechanical, and electrical properties.13
The largest commercial application for 3D printing today is rapid prototyping, which accounts for about 70 percent of the 3D printing market.14Rapid prototyping shortens the development life cycle, enables easy experimentation and innovation, saves costs by allowing for easy tweaks and changes to the design, and increases confidence in the final product.15Increasingly, 3D printers are being used for direct digital manufacturing (DDM).16As illustrated below, whether through prototyping or DDM, 3D printing is being used in a broad range of industries.
The aerospace industry is using 3D printing to improve performance, shorten manufacturing runs, and save costs. Boeing 3D prints over 22,000 parts for military and commercial aircraft.17For example, it prints aircraft ducting as one piece. With traditional manufacturing methods, it had about 20 parts.18The new component reduces inventory, speeds installation, inspection, and maintenance, and saves fuel by decreasing aircraft weight.19
The automotive industry also uses 3D printing. Ford and other major manufacturers have used 3D printing for prototyping for years.20BMW has created ergonomic, lighter versions of assembly tools to increase worker productivity on assembly lines.21KOR EcoLogic has created the Urbee—the world's first car with a 3D printed body—which could be in low-volume production by 2014.22
In the defense industry, the U.S. government has used 3D printing in combination with traditional manufacturing to save millions of dollars and provide improved and timely training in areas such as avionics, weapons, telecommunications, and medical readiness.23A defense development company has printed mounts for gun sights that are used on tanks.24By switching to 3D printing, the company reduced manufacturing costs by over $60,000 per unit.25The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has used 3D printing to create topographical models on-the-fly to provide better intelligence, which is particularly useful when responding to natural disasters.26This technology was used when responding to Hurricane Katrina to show changing floodwater levels, buildings, and other features of the affected area.27
3D printing is making great strides in healthcare. Take Emma, a young girl born with arthrogryposis, who wears 3D printed "magic arms" that give her the strength to lift her real arms.283D printing enables the magic arms to be reprinted as she grows, to maintain the device's efficacy and comfort.29Another example is Kaiba Gionfridd, an infant near death because of a rare obstruction in his lungs called bronchial malacia, who received a 3D printed bio-absorbable splint that created a path through his blocked lung.30After taking a CT scan, doctors generated a model that exactly matched his organs' dimensions. The splint will degrade over time, enabling the boy's lung to develop normally.31
Companies also are making custom-printed hearing aids and coverings for artificial limbs.32In 2011, an 83-year-old woman received a 3D printed jaw transplant.33In 2013, a man had 75 percent of his skull replaced with a custom-made implant.34Aiding recovery for wounded soldiers, the Walter Reed Army Medical Center has 3D printed and implanted titanium cranial plates.35By allowing for customization, 3D printed implants have the added advantage of perfectly matching a patient's body to provide better fixation, which reduces surgery time and infection.36At the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, scientists are working on a variety of human parts, including ears, fingers, muscle, and a long-term effort to print a human kidney.37Organovo is a publicly traded company doing the same thing. These structures could eventually solve the organ donor shortage and help repair or replace impaired body parts.38
The fashion industry is adopting 3D printing as well. Designers are now 3D printing jewelry and clothing.39In March 2013, Dita Von Teese unveiled the world's first fully-articulated dress produced with a 3D printer.403D printing eventually will change the way lifestyle products are made and sold. Tailors could customize clothing on a computer and print the products in a store. Hybrid inks might allow for shape-shifting clothing to accommodate changes in body weight. Scouring through stores for the right size may become a thing of the past.
Consumers and kids are starting to adopt 3D printing. It was a big hit at the Consumer Electronics Show in 2013, winning an award for "Best Emerging Technology."413D Systems' "Cube" and Makerbot/Stratasys' "Replicator 2" cost around $1,300 and $2,000, respectively.423D printers are now being sold in Staples and through SkyMall. Aiming to get 3D printers into schools across the country, the creator of the Printrbot Jr. is offering its printers for around $400.43Putting 3D printers into schools will educate youth on the technology while allowing students to tap into their creative abilities. With low-cost 3D printing, anyone with a digital design can bypass traditional supply chains and self-manufacture a product.44Not surprisingly, 3D printing has created a new generation of at-home and do-it-yourself manufacturers.45
The number of designs available for consumers is rapidly increasing, and owning a CAD program is no longer necessary to utilize a 3D printer. Microsoft has adapted its popular Kinect device to make 3D scanning easy and inexpensive.463D printing also has a vibrant open-innovation community, known as Makers, that shares designs that are available for downloading and printing by anyone. One such Web site is Thingiverse.com, which is an online marketplace for sharing 3D designs freely.47Another Web site, Shapeways, which some people believe will become the eBay of the 3D printed world, allows digital designers to post and sell their products, while Shapeways handles 3D printed manufacturing and delivery.48
There are many companies making and using 3D printers, some of which have been mentioned above, but a few stand out. Stratasys and 3D Systems, both of which are publicly traded, are the largest players and vie for the top spot. Both sell printers for individual and commercial use. Electro-Optical Systems (EOS) is a leader for integrated e-manufacturing solutions for industrial applications.49Its technology is used to make diverse products, such as dental prosthetics, medical implants, watches, and footwear.50ExOne is another publicly traded 3D printing company that sells high-end machines for printing metal, ceramics, and glass.51MakerBot Industries, which is owned by Stratasys, sells low-cost desktop printers, and will soon sell a desktop 3D scanner.52
Named one of the 50 Most Innovative Companies by MIT Technology Review, Organovo is a public company that focuses on 3D printing in healthcare.53Instead of using plastics, metals, or glass, its feed material is human cells— "bio-ink".54Organovo has printed human veins, arteries, and even heart cells.55Its bio-printer has the potential to offer unique medical advances by printing human tissue that can be used for regenerative medicine, modeling specific diseases, and drug testing.56These companies, and many others, are making 3D printing available for applications, in all industries, and at home.
3D printing will affect the world in many ways. On the micro level, 3D printing will enhance manufacturing efficiency. Because one machine creates everything, no retooling or assembly is required and production can be finished in fewer steps.57Owing to the ease of altering a design with a computer, customization and complexity will become increasingly affordable, and batches of one can be created on demand without costing more per unit than if the product were mass produced.583D printing also enables manufacturers to make designs having interior structures that are impossible to make with traditional manufacturing, resulting in superior product performance.59
On the macro level, 3D printing has the potential to disrupt or destroy traditional models of manufacturing, distribution, warehousing, shipping, and retailing.60The world will become smaller, with products being made where they are needed. Future sales will be of designs, not products, and because 3D printing allows a product to be printed where it is needed, warehouses may be replaced with digital inventories.61Lower entry barriers will allow more local and small businesses to thrive.62Instead of relying on traditional manufacturing chains, people will design and print their own products or have a local service bureau print it for them.63
3D printing can alleviate some of the environmental problems associated with traditional manufacturing. By reducing the need to ship physical products and efficiently using raw materials, 3D printing saves energy.64By combining 3D printing with the energy-saving efforts that most countries are undertaking, jobs can be repatriated or kept at home. 3D printing will eliminate some manufacturing jobs, but it should create others. New jobs, coupled with diminishing cost savings of off-shoring, give 3D printing the potential to foster a manufacturing renaissance in countries with strong intellectual capital but high manufacturing and labor costs.65
Notwithstanding the potential popularity, mainstream success, and technological efficiencies of 3D printing, history suggests that IP battles are brewing in the world of 3D printing technology. When entrenched interests see a disruptive player entering the landscape, they defend their incumbent power.66The arrival of the printing press led to new censorship and licensing laws aimed at slowing the spread of information.67The movie industry fought the VCR, comparing it to the Boston Strangler preying on a woman home alone.68The music industry feared destruction from home taping.69The Internet and file sharing have forever changed the music industry. However, with the advent of new technologies, older ones appear more primitive and slowly vanish, and the incumbents are painted as self-interested Luddites.
IP owners have reason to be worried about 3D printing, which eventually will allow almost anyone to recreate any existing product design, change, and manufacture the product to their liking, and use or distribute it (and its concomitant CAD design). When 3D printing of complex structures, such as electronic devices, becomes commonplace in the home, 3D printing may stress the utility patent system in the same manner that the digital revolution, the Internet, and file sharing stressed the music industry and the copyright system. Utility patent owners may be overwhelmed by infringement. Even if patent owners are aware of infringement, determining who and where to sue may be problematic because suing thousands of at-home manufacturers would not be cost effective. Principles of contributory or induced infringement may be of limited value if CAD files are shared freely, peer-to-peer, or are available from pirates or black market sources.
3D printing could lead to a renaissance for design patents. Automobile manufacturers are increasingly relying on this long-neglected tool for protecting the ornamental designs of replacement parts.70Other manufacturers might be motivated to follow suit and obtain design patents to prevent third parties from entering the replacement-parts market. However, the flexibility of CAD designs may make it easy to produce a design-around without changing the product's function. Thus, there may be a resurgence in design patents, but may have limited value against widespread home 3D printing.
Regarding copyrights, most products and devices are not copyrightable. Products that are copyrightable, such as dolls, action figures and figurines, and toys, are especially vulnerable to 3D printing at home, where infringement is essentially undetectable. Duplicating copyrighted statuettes, figurines, and toys is simple, making infringement as easy as illegally downloading music. Toys can be scanned and 3D printed at home, and the designs can be shared peer-to-peer, thereby stressing copyright and design patent protection for such products.
Trademark owners also may be affected when branded products are copied at home. 3D printers may be a steroid for counterfeiters. Particularly troublesome for trademark owners may be their inability to maintain proper quality control over trademarked products 3D printed by unknown parties. Traditional manufacturers may look to product configuration and trade dress protection, but such means of protection are likely to have limited value.
The extent to which 3D printing will harm IP is unclear, but it is clear that open systems, such as Wikipedia, are on the rise. Just as Wikipedia rendered "closed" competitors such as Encyclopedia Britannica obsolete, 3D printing has similar potential to stress IP systems.
In their early days, no one knew how computers would be used, or how they would change our lives. An early Apple ad touted that families could "create dazzling color displays" and "invent their own Pong games" on a home computer.71In the not-so-distant past, people pondered: What is the Internet and how will it affect our lives? Why would I need a Smartphone? Early adopters of home 3D printers ask the same questions and struggle to see how they may be used in 2, 3, 10, 20 years. Many people have not even heard of them and have no idea what they already are capable of doing, on either the industrial level or in the home. But 3D printing is reaching a tipping point.
For the IP community, 3D printing raises important questions: Is the current IP regime up to the task of protecting IP in a 3D printed world? How can protection from infringement be balanced with the ability to innovate? Will IP survive, or are we headed for a worldwide open technology community? Is IP fundamentally in conflict with the 3D printed world? Business leaders, policymakers, legislators, lawyers, and judges will be on the front lines, addressing these issues and others that are difficult to quantify and imagine at this time.72Only time will provide the answers to those questions, but regardless of the outcome, recognizing that changes are coming and evolving with those changes will be crucial for maintaining a successful IP portfolio or legal practice.
1"A Third Industrial Revolution," The Economist (Apr. 21, 2012), available at http://www.economist.com/node/21553017.
2Steven Kurutz, "A Factory on Your Kitchen Counter," N.Y. Times, Feb. 20, 2013, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/21/garden/the-3-d-
printer-may-be-the-home-appliance-of-the-future.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0.
3See Michael Weinberg, "It Will Be Awesome If They Don't Screw It Up: 3D Printing, Intellectual Property, and the Fight Over the Next Great Disruptive Technology,"Public Knowledge 2-3 (Nov. 2010), http://www.publicknowledge.org/files/docs/3DPrintingPaperPublicKnowledge.pdf.
4CSC Leading Edge Forum, "3D Printing and the Future of Manufacturing" 5 (Fall 2012).
5CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 6.
6See id.
7Id.
8Id.
9Id.
10"3-D Printer Used to Make Bone-Like Material," Science Daily (Nov. 30, 2011), http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111129185923.htm.
11"3D printers could create customized drugs on demand," BBC News (Apr. 18, 2012), http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17760085.
12See CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 7-8; http://www.3ders.org/articles/20130619-us-researchers-develop-3d-printed-tiny-lithium-batteries.html.
13See CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 7.
14Id. at 9.
15Id.
16Scott Crump, "Direct Digital Manufacturing Part Four: Industries and Applications," Stratasys, (last visited May 29, 2013).
17Paul Davidson, "3-D printing could remake U.S. manufacturing," USA Today (July 10, 2012), http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/industries/manufacturing/story/2012-07-10/digitalmanufacturing/56135298/1.
18Wohlers Associates Inc., Additive Manufacturing Technology Roadmap for Australia 22, (March 2011).
19Id.
20See CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 11.
21See Stratasys, "Prototyping is the driving force behind great cars," http://www.stratasys.com/resources/case-studies/automotive/bmw (last visited May 29, 2013).
22CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 11-12.
23Id. at 10.
24Stratasys, "3D printing has your back when you need it most," http://www.stratasys.com/resources/case-studies/defense/eoir-technology (last visited May 30, 2013).
25Id.
26CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 10.
27Id.
28Id. at 13.
29Id.
30Stephanie Smith, "3-D printer helps save dying baby," CNN Health (May 23, 2013), http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/22/health/baby-
surgery/index.html?sr=sharebar_Facebook.
31Id.
32CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 13.
33Monica Dybuncio, "Woman gets world's first 3D printed jaw transplant," CBS News (Feb. 6, 2012), http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-
57372076-10391704/woman-gets-worlds-first-3d-printed-jawtransplant/.
34Salvador Rodriguez, "Man has 75% of skull replaced with 3-D printed implant," L.A. Times (Mar. 8, 2013), http://articles.latimes.com/2013/mar/08/business/la-fi-tn-skull-3dprinted-implant-75-20130308.
35Doug Smock, "High-Tech Implants," Design News (May 19, 2011).
36Id.
37CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 12-13.
38Id.
39Michael Wolf, "Forget 3D Printers. The Early 3D Printing Action is All About the Services," Forbes (Mar. 5, 2013), http://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelwolf/2013/03/05/forget-3d-printers-the-early-3d-printing-action-is-all-about-the-services/.
40Michael Rundle, "Dita Von Teese Wears 'World First' Articulated 3D Printed Dress—And It's Based On the Fibonacci Sequence,"HuffPost Tech (Aug. 3, 2013), http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/03/08/dita-vonteese-wears-3d-printed-dress_n_2835351.html.
41See Rich Brown, "Best of CES Emerging Tech: 3D Systems CubeX 3D Printer," CNET (Jan. 11, 2013), http://ces.cnet.com/8301-34441_1-57563538/best-of-ces-emerging-tech-3d-systems-cubex-3d-printer/.
42Cubify, http://cubify.com/cube/ (last visited May 30, 2013); MakerBot, (last visited May 30, 2013).
43Zach Walton, "Want A 3D Printer On The Cheap? Back This Kickstarter," WebProNews (Nov. 30, 2012).
44See CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 14-16.
45Id.
46Ina Fried, "Heads Turn as Microsoft Shows off 3-D Scanning Techniques," AllThingsD (Mar. 6, 2013), http://allthingsd.com/20130306/heads-turn-as-microsoft-shows-off-3d-scanning-techniques/.
47Kurutz, supra n.2.
48Anthony Wing Kosner, "Shapeways Raises $30 Million To Bring High-Quality 3D Printing To Everyone," Forbes (Apr. 23, 2013), http://www.forbes.com/sites/anthonykosner/2013/04/23/shapeways-raises-30-million-to-bring-high-quality-3d-printing-to-everyone/.
49Electro-Optical Systems, http://www.eos.info/en (last visited May 30, 2013).
50Id.
51ExOne, http://www.exone.com/ (last visited May 30, 2013).
52MakerBot (last visited May 30, 2013).
53See Justin Fritz, "The Most Innovative 3-D Printing Company, Hands Down," Wall St. Daily (Mar. 21, 2012).
54Id.
55Id.
56Jason Napodano, "ONVO—Initiating Coverage of Organovo," Zacks SCR (Aug. 20, 2012), http://scr.zacks.com/News/Press-Releases/Press-Release-Details/2012/ONVO---Initiating-Coverage-of-Organovo-/default.aspx.
57See, e.g., CSC Leading Edge Forum, supra n.4 at 2-4.
58Id. at 2-4, 21.
59Id. at 6-7.
60Id. at 15, 21.
61Id. at 18, 28
62Id. at 4.
63Id. at 15, 18.
64Id. at 4, 6, 10, 18.
65Id. at 9, 26.
66Weinberg, supra n.3 at 1.
67Id.
68Id.
69Id.
70Design Patent and Replacement Parts, PatentlyO (Mar. 22, 2010), http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2010/03/design-patent-and-replacement-parts.html.
71Kurutz, supra n.2.
72Weinberg, supra n.3 at 15.
Copyright © Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP. This article is for informational purposes, is not intended to constitute legal advice, and may be considered advertising under applicable state laws. This article is only the opinion of the authors and is not attributable to Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP, or the firm's clients.
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