What is Metrology Part 4: Proto3000

Proto3000

Proto3000 provides end-to-end advanced manufacturing solutions that leverage design, additive manufacturing, and metrology to reduce product design cycles, enhance prototyping capabilities, improve production efficiency, and maximize supply-chain flexibility. They have a suite of 3D printing and 3D scanning products and services. This enables their customers to solve tough engineering and manufacturing challenges while empowering their design teams to make better products. They integrate other 3D printing systems with scanning technology made by outside companies. This allows organizations to create products in a more seamless manner. Today, I will be taking a look into the company. 

I believe Proto3000 has an interesting business model. They are based in Canada and are integrating popular 3D printing and additive manufacturing systems such as Desktop Metal, Stratasys, and others with their metrology equipment. It gives them leverage in two manners. Firstly, on their site, they are able to sell various brand name printers and scanners as a third party supplier. It gives them a longevity play in the sense that these larger 3D printing brands already are synchronous with their products. They also provide design services for organizations. This makes their organization a one stop shop for design, engineering, as well as metrology. This differentiates them from other organizations within the metrology space as a design oriented company. 

The mission of Proto3000 is simple: They are committed to helping companies leverage advanced manufacturing using additive manufacturing and metrology solutions. They are looking to equip an organization with the knowledge, tools, and resources needed to reinvent and create new ideas and products. 

Proto3000 offers a variety of metrology hardware products. The majority of the scanning hardware they use is from the company Creaform3D. Some of them include:

1. HandySCAN 3D
2. MetraSCAN Optical CMM 3D Scanner
3. MetraSCAN 3D R-Series
4. Go!SCAN 3D
5. Go!SCAN SPARK
6. Peel 3D Scanner
7. MaxSHOT 3D
8. HandyPROBE Next

Proto3000 has a team that is dedicated to helping outside companies in terms of their project needs in terms of rapid prototyping and metrology. Their business cycle goes like this:

1. You Bring Your Project to Them

2. Ship Out Your Parts or They will come onsite to your organization

3. Their Team Analyzes & 3D Scans Parts

4. They Send Over Your CAD File

They have a team dedicated to taking care of an organization’s metrology needs. Their 3D scanning services will provide you with simple reports streamlining your inspection process, and a workable mesh for simple reverse engineering. This is probably the most useful of all their services. Being able to have a CAD file on hand is crucial for organizations looking to replicate their work. 

This organization is interesting in terms of the services they provide towards organizations in need of reverse engineering, 3D modeling, metrology, and product design. The business model is diverse, but it is indeed service-based. Service based business models are hit or miss for me. I say this because I wonder what happens when a larger organization dedicated themselves to learning how to do things such as laser scanning with the various equipment out on the market. It is a good model in terms of being ahead of the curve and providing this solution before a variety of people have, but I am a bit conflicted as I feel that the skill to operate such metrology devices may make them accessible. The business model of this organization is still good though, and they have a good value proposition. Outside of this, they have also built great partnerships from larger manufacturers. I’d be interested to know what the organization’s plans are within the future. In the next article, I will focus more on the technology company that provides the 3D scanners.