Oct 4, 2016 | By Benedict

Polar 3D, the Cincinnati-based educational 3D printing specialist, has announced that its Polar Cloud 3D printing platform has reached 100,000 print jobs. The company has also closed a $2 million financing round and added new staff to its executive team.

They’ll try to play it cool, but staff at Polar 3D have cause to celebrate this week after clocking up 100,000 prints on the Polar Cloud, now the fastest growing online platform for 3D printing in education. The Polar Cloud is an online social platform that encourages young people to share and collaborate on 3D printable designs over the web, giving learners access to a wide catalogue of materials and special “challenges” which can be used as lesson plans or individual projects.

“As this school year got underway, we saw a major ramp-up of 3D print jobs on our Polar Cloud,” said Greg LaLonde, CEO of Polar 3D. “We are thrilled the experience is moving past the 3D printer itself to a truly collaborative environment where student-led learning, discovery, and ‘making’ are exploding. There is simply no limit to how much these kids want to show off their work. It's intoxicating, contagious, and is why the Polar Cloud affords an unusually large-scale opportunity.”

In addition to celebrating the exciting milestone of 100,000 prints, Polar 3D also closed out a $2 million convertible note financing on September 30. This figure adds to the $1.5 million previously raised in funding, while a $6.5 million Series A round is planned for 2017. According to the company, the $2 million raised last week will go towards funding and accelerating the growth of the Polar Cloud.

With both print jobs and funding coming in at a healthy rate, Polar 3D has also hired two new members of staff: Dan Newman, who will serve as as Chief Technology Officer, and David Thornburg, who becomes Director of Education. Thornburg, who has taught at Stanford, invented the touch screen technology used in early PDAs, and began working with Polar 3D after the company acquired the STEAMtrax online curriculum from 3D Systems. Newman also has extensive experience in the 3D printing industry.

“Everyone knows of Dan [Newman],” said Bill Steele, Co-founder of Polar 3D. “He wrote the firmware used by our competitors' printers (Makerbot, Dremel, etc.) and helped Apple design their solution to scale iCloud. Dan is going to make a massive impact on our cloud and hardware products—we are very lucky to have him.”

“Naturally, when the opportunity arose to grab David Thornburg we took it and didn't let go,” added Ed Estes, Co-founder of Polar 3D. “David literally wrote the book on 3D printing in the classroom and is globally recognized as a pioneer in the field of 3D printing in education.”

In addition to running the Polar Cloud, Polar 3D also manufactures its own filament the $899 Polar 3D Printer. The FDM machine uses polar coordinates instead of a Cartesian system, has a 314 cubic inch build volume, and weighs only 10lbs. Users can achieve layer resolutions of 50-400 microns.

On January 1, 2017, the Polar Cloud 2.0 will be launched, as the company aims to add new features and improve user experience on the educational platform.

 

 

Posted in 3D Printer Company

 

 

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Backer Community wrote at 10/4/2016 11:03:19 PM:

let's not forget the crowd funding customers that gave this business and William "Bill" Steele the stepping stone for this project. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/wjsteele/ultra-bot-3d-printer/comments



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