Home 3D Printer Global 3D Printer Shipments Increased by 30% in 2015

Global 3D Printer Shipments Increased by 30% in 2015

According to a report released by IT market research company CONTEXT, worldwide 3D printer shipments rose by 19% in the last quarter of 2015, with 73,012 units shipped.

Desktop 3D printers (priced below $ 5,000) account for 96% of the shipped units and represent a 22% year-on-year growth rate, however, shipments of industrial and professional-grade devices decreased by 24% with 2,907 printers shipped.

In the full year of 2015, 30% more 3D printers were shipped in total, representing a year-on-year growth for desktop devices of 33% and a decrease for industrial machines of 9%.

Chris Connery, VP for Global Analysis at CONTEXT, commented: “This nascent side of the 3D printer market again saw great changes in 2015. Companies with a long standing presence in the additive manufacturing market scaled back their expectations for this newer, desktop side of the market, retooling to concentrate more on their core B2B competences. Other brands look to capitalize on these refocused efforts, however with start-ups, toy companies, IT companies and tool companies all competing in the market from different angles, yet all looking to get a piece of the continued strong demand for these devices.”

Taiwanese manufacturer XYZprinting took the lead in 2015 for the shipment of desktop 3D printers, with a 31% share for Q4 and a 21% share for the full year of 2015.

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In the second half of 2015, with former market leaders Stratasys (MakerBot) and 3D Systems (Cubify) taking the focus off desktop printers, other companies including XYZprinting and M3D picked up. Additionally, the TIKO 3D printer was introduced through a crowdsourcing campaign, with over 16,000 of the $ 179 units pre-ordered, to be shipped in 2016. According to CONTEXT the growth in 2016 will be fueled by even more aggressively priced 3D printers.

The market for industrial and professional-grade 3D printers was characterised by a great hype in 2013 and 2014 and began to settle down in the second half of 2015. Stratasys holds a share of 48% in Q4 2015, however, sold 29% fewer units compared to the previous year. The market for metal 3D printer saw a growth of 35% in machines sold.

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Connery adds: “Since the 3D Printer industry consists of a wide range of prices for the various types of 3D Printing technologies, the market is often benchmarked not only on units, but also on revenue from the sale of printers. “Doing so helps to show the growing importance of Metal 3D Printing overall with 2015 seeing three of the top five vendors all mostly concentrating on metal additive manufacturing (EOS, SLM Solutions and Arcam).


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