It was April of 2014, and I was in New York City to attend the Inside 3D Printing Conference. The hotel I was staying at with my wife Whitney and brother Brian, offered a decent breakfast buffet, so we were sure to grab a bite to eat before heading off to one of the largest 3D printing events of the year. As we sat eating our muffins and sipping our coffee, Brian and I couldn’t help but overhear a young man with a full sleeve tattoo talking about a 3D printer that he was working on. Neither of us recognized this fellow, but the conviction with which he spoke, and the intelligence that he obviously exuded, intrigued us. Not wanting to interrupt his meal with a colleague, we instead decided we would try and seek him out at the show. Unfortunately we never bumped into each other that week, but low and behold we would soon be hearing from him the following month.
New Matter CEO Steve Schell
In May of 2014, a new company emerged onto the scenes with an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign for a 3D printer that was priced lower than any other 3D printer ever created. That company was New Matter, and that man that we sat next to at breakfast back in April was their co-founder and CEO, Steve Schell. Coming to this realization, I was very confident that this crowdfunding campaign would be a successful one.
The New Matter MOD-t 3D printer was available starting at just $149 to the first 500 backers of their campaign, with later backers getting in on it for $199 and $249 respectively. In the end, the company raised $683,804 via Indiegogo, and since that time they have been designing, developing and iterating upon prototypes of the machine.
The company has already won several awards, such as “CE Week Best In Show” and the “CES 2015 Innovation Award”. Just last week, we reported that New Matter had officially begun shipping their 3D printers to backers, as they also provided a sneak peek of their ‘3D Printing Store”. Today comes more good news, specifically for individuals and companies who missed out on the Indiegogo campaign last year.
“New Matter is elated to announce that the MOD-t 3D printer is now available to order on newmatter.com,” the company explained. “We will begin delivering MOD-t’s after our Indiegogo orders have been fulfilled, approximately 15 weeks from now. Thank you so much for your patience and understanding.”
The printer, which isn’t priced quite as low as the original $149-$249 price tag that was offered to Indiegogo backers, is still available at an almost unheard of price of just $399. Along with the printer, also various colors of PLA filament are now available on the website starting at $24.99 for a 0.5kg spool. The current lead time on the website states that you can expect to wait 16 weeks until your printer is delivered, which means that if you order today, you can expect to have your printer by the middle of October.
The New Matter MOD-t 3D Printer
It will certainly be interesting to see how well the MOD-t sells post-Indiegogo, and what retail partnerships they may have in the works. With a price tag as low as $399, and a machine that I can say I’ve seen in person work very well, it wouldn’t surprise me if we are talking about New Matter quite a bit in the coming months and years. I know I’m looking forward to getting my MOD-t very soon, as I was one of the 500 initial backers at just $149.
What do you think about the MOD-t? Did you back it via Indiegogo? Discuss in the MOD-t forum on 3DPB.com. Be sure to check out the video below showing how the New Matter Store and ecosystem funtions.
