For one, this area of research is considered high risk. Not every proven scientifi c idea for a manufacturing technology is scalable for the com- mercial market, in terms of repeatability, quality or cost. So this is an area where shortcomings, some of them insurmountable, are often exposed, and money is inevitably lost. A lot of money. Converting a proven scientifi c idea into a commercial manufacturing technology is very, very expensive, partly because it can take a lot of time, involving many rounds of trial and er- ror, as well as intersecting sciences. Development of these technologies can be slow, incremental and span decades.
Consider this high risk and cost with the objec- tives of investors, who want short-term results, or CEOs, who are under pressure to deliver them, and many companies simply fi nd it diffi cult to justify—unless compelled by regulation or some other force.
Which is why governments often step in to bet on a potential payoff for their citizenry. The development of modern solar panels, for example, has literally taken centuries, starting in the early 1800s, when the photovoltaic effect was fi rst observed, and running right through until present times. The painstaking work of fi guring out how to manufacture solar cells, which make up a panel, and honing their effi ciency and making them scalable has also spanned several continents. The US Department of Energy invested mil- lions in the solar panel industry in the 2000s. “But China matched our millions with billions,” Schmid noted. And, the US solar industry collapsed. Time and time again, history has shown that it takes a phenomenal amount of time and money to develop the manufacturing technologies necessary to make a product for the masses at a high quality and affordable cost. Remember GE’s previously mentioned plan for the fl at-
Voxel8, based in Somerville, MA, is a US company that is trying to get a promising new manufacturing technology off the ground. Later this year,
Voxel8 will begin delivery of the world’s fi rst 3D electronics printer, which can rapidly embed 3D circuitry into a broad array of materials and holds the promise of making a wide range of future products. The printer is based on more than a decade of research into conductive inks by Prof. Jennifer A. Lewis at Harvard University, and previously, at the University of Illinois. Voxel co-founders Daniel Oliver and Michael Bell showed off the technology at RAPID 2015.
It wasn’t until the late 1990s, nearly four decades after
GE fi rst came up with the idea, that fl at-screen TVs became scalable and affordable because of improvements made in the methods of manufacturing them. Today, most fl at- screen TVs are made in Taiwan, along with many spin-out technologies that depend on the underlying technology to make the TVs.
screen TV? It shows just how expensive and risky these endeavors can be. GE ultimately decided not to invest in the concept, which led an American electrical engineer, Wil- liam Ross Aiken, to try his hand at developing it. His efforts failed, and the Pennsylvania Philco Co. ended up launching a cathode-ray fl at-screen TV in 1958. That, too, fl opped, help- ing to send Philco into bankruptcy.
These integrated supply chains of manufacturing technol- ogy communities, and their collective knowledge, help to tell the story of why manufacturing has one of the strongest economic multipliers in the economy.
But the amount of time it takes to develop the technolo- gies needed to manufacture materials, parts and products cannot be overstated.
June 2015 |
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