Lasers & Sources

Glowforge launches 3D laser printer family after record crowdfunding orders of nearly $28M (see video demo)

April 26, 2018

Now that pre-orders have been completed, the Glowforge 3D laser printer line is being launched for general sale.

The Glowforge home laser printer uses 40 to 45 W lasers in a self-contained system to easily print products in wood, leather, and many more materials. After a crowdfunding campaign, the product is now available for general sale.

Glowforge (Seattle, WA) launched its line of 3D laser printers today, giving creators, families, and small businesses the ability to bring their ideas to life at the push of a button. In 2015, Glowforge made a staggering introduction when it set a 30-day crowdfunding record of more than $27,900,000 by pre-selling its laser printers. Now that pre-orders have been completed, its product is being launched for the general public. The 3D laser printer has already been used to print everything from personalized leather pet collars to coffee makers to outdoor business signs--even a pediatric surgical training tool.

For the first time ever, Glowforge says that laser cutting and engraving technology has been freed from the factory and made easy and affordable for home and small business use (see video below).

"From the very start, we designed the Glowforge 3D laser printer to unlock people's creativity," said Dan Shapiro, CEO of Glowforge. "We set out to re-invent the idea of 'homemade'. What if you could print what you wanted, when you needed it? What if you could sketch a design, then turn it into something real you could use, without complicated software? What if your gifts were personal instead of purchased? What if it was easy to print your ideas a hundred times, so you could launch a business?"

Glowforge sets up in just minutes and works via Wi-Fi. No software is required, as it uses the web browser or app on any Mac, PC, tablet, and smartphone. Users can create and print from software including Adobe Illustrator, Inkscape, CorelDraw, Adobe Photoshop, GIMP, Autodesk 360, and Sketchup. They can also bypass software altogether--the onboard cameras can scan a drawing and transform it directly into a beautiful print on almost any material.

Glowforge prints on leather, wood, acrylic, paper, fabric, cardboard, metal, glass, ceramic, stone, laptops and even chocolate. To make things even easier, Glowforge offers a line of Proofgrade materials digitally encoded so Glowforge printers can recognize them and auto-adjust to print perfectly each time.

The Glowforge Basic, Plus, and Pro are now available for purchase at Glowforge.com and range in price from $2495 to $5995 and incorporate 40 and 45 W laser sources.

SOURCE: Business Wire via Glowforge; https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180423005466/en/Glowforge-Launches-3D-Laser-Printer-Crowdfunding-History

About the Author

Gail Overton | Senior Editor (2004-2020)

Gail has more than 30 years of engineering, marketing, product management, and editorial experience in the photonics and optical communications industry. Before joining the staff at Laser Focus World in 2004, she held many product management and product marketing roles in the fiber-optics industry, most notably at Hughes (El Segundo, CA), GTE Labs (Waltham, MA), Corning (Corning, NY), Photon Kinetics (Beaverton, OR), and Newport Corporation (Irvine, CA). During her marketing career, Gail published articles in WDM Solutions and Sensors magazine and traveled internationally to conduct product and sales training. Gail received her BS degree in physics, with an emphasis in optics, from San Diego State University in San Diego, CA in May 1986.