In this series, we’re using cutting-edge AI research tools, including an unreleased deep research tool to look at the desktop 3D printing filament market. We’re then comparing it with our known data to see where AI research tools make sense, and where (and how) they make mistakes. The idea is to at the same time let your learn about the current state of the desktop 3D printing filament market, while also honing your AI skill and knowing if you should be using LLMs for research at all.
Here, (as we can see from the image above) the LLM was a bit feckless with the data. If we look at more sources, especially European ones, then Recreus has a strong position in high-quality flexible materials. But the scraping tool missed the European vendor entirely. Also, TPU is widely sold; it’s just that no one excels in it. Online mentions, forum mentions, and things like this skewed the overall perception towards Ninja as well. I’m not saying it’s bad; it’s good stuff, but for many things, Recreus is much better, especially for footwear. Of late, Recreus has also been much more innovative. But, there are more novices talking about getting TPU to work in the US than there are talking in-depth about footwear TPU publicly. The scraping tool also did not at all find ColorFabb’s Varioshore TPU. This is probably the single biggest innovation in TPU. In orthotics and beyond, it’s Varioshore that is doing incredibly well because you can program it. Perhaps because people call it Varioshore it hadn’t seen it as TPU? Because the scraping tool missed ColorFabb TPU and Recreus, it spotted this huge market gap in TPU. I left this in there to illustrate a point. Check, check, check again. Because it’s so easy to screw this up. Imagine a company new to filament looking at this and concluding that the TPU market is wide open because the tool essentially missed two of the major competitors.
I completely don’t agree that PEEK and TPU are similar. TPU, for many people, would be much more price-sensitive. If I’m doing something with PEEK, it’s because I need to use PEEK, which means that this expensive application or part is critical somehow, and I may be able to and want to pay for quality. For TPU, this is less of an issue, and things that need to work, such as shoes or braces, are high-volume items, so I’d want much better pricing and be sensitive to it. So again, the slide looks great initially but is super misleading. And indeed, if this were a cornerstone to planning your market entry, you would make the wrong decision.
PEEK is complex, and the tolerances, equipment, and material cost are high. Also, for some reason, Notebook kept throwing in BASF in the Engineering tier because of Ultrafuse. This could also be confusing.
Churn & Premium Buying (And Blatant AI Errors)
Now, the above chart is very pretty; it’s also very wrong. Off-gassing is not what ruins prints; it’s outgas
In this series, we’re using cutting-edge AI research tools, including an unreleased deep research tool to look at the desktop 3D printing filament market. We’re then comparing it with our known data to see where AI research tools make sense, and where (and how) they make mistakes. The idea is to at the same time let your learn about the current state of the desktop 3D printing filament market, while also honing your AI skill and knowing if you should be using LLMs for research at all.
Here, (as we can see from the image above) the LLM was a bit feckless with the data. If we look at more sources, especially European ones, then Recreus has a strong position in high-quality flexible materials. But the scraping tool missed the European vendor entirely. Also, TPU is widely sold; it’s just that no one excels in it. Online mentions, forum mentions, and things like this skewed the overall perception towards Ninja as well. I’m not saying it’s bad; it’s good stuff, but for many things, Recreus is much better, especially for footwear. Of late, Recreus has also been much more innovative. But, there are more novices talking about getting TPU to work in the US than there are talking in-depth about footwear TPU publicly. The scraping tool also did not at all find ColorFabb’s Varioshore TPU. This is probably the single biggest innovation in TPU. In orthotics and beyond, it’s Varioshore that is doing incredibly well because you can program it. Perhaps because people call it Varioshore it hadn’t seen it as TPU? Because the scraping tool missed ColorFabb TPU and Recreus, it spotted this huge market gap in TPU. I left this in there to illustrate a point. Check, check, check again. Because it’s so easy to screw this up. Imagine a company new to filament looking at this and concluding that the TPU market is wide open because the tool essentially missed two of the major competitors.
I completely don’t agree that PEEK and TPU are similar. TPU, for many people, would be much more price-sensitive. If I’m doing something with PEEK, it’s because I need to use PEEK, which means that this expensive application or part is critical somehow, and I may be able to and want to pay for quality. For TPU, this is less of an issue, and things that need to work, such as shoes or braces, are high-volume items, so I’d want much better pricing and be sensitive to it. So again, the slide looks great initially but is super misleading. And indeed, if this were a cornerstone to planning your market entry, you would make the wrong decision.
PEEK is complex, and the tolerances, equipment, and material cost are high. Also, for some reason, Notebook kept throwing in BASF in the Engineering tier because of Ultrafuse. This could also be confusing.
Churn & Premium Buying (And Blatant AI Errors)
Now, the above chart is very pretty; it’s also very wrong. Off-gassing is not what ruins prints; it’s outgas