What the Real Goal of 3D Printing Is

Last week, DuPont Displays announced the development of a manufacturing process that the company says can be used to print large, high-performance OLED televisions at volumes that should bring down costs. Using a custom-made printer from Japanese manufacturer Dainippon Screen, DuPont says it can print a 50-inch television in under two minutes, and testing of the displays shows their performance is reliable–the displays should last 15 years.

I believe them.  This is the goal of the 3D printing movement: ever-smaller resolution printing, which makes possible apparently solid things like TVs and computing pads which can be made cheaply and DROPPED without being destroyed.  Oh, yes, and most anything else, too.

Other companies are working on OLED and especially OLED inks, including Universal Display Corporation (United States), Merck (no surprise)  in Germany, and Sumitomo Chemical.  Kateeva, (Menlo Park, CA) is developing OLED-printing equipment that uses shadow-mask fabrication tech with ink-jet printing.

Exciting update: the DuPont printing a TV in under two minutes is absolutely unsupported by any research I am able to carry out. I was reading MIT’s Technology Review and they said it. I can’t find any REAL information about this, and have to assume Technology Review is full of shit, and Katherine Bourzac made up that quote. I would try to check this with her, but she apparently has no e-mail address, unlike other contributors to Technology Review. The other staff of Technology Review ignored my inquiries about this. Thoroughly.