The ambition among tech investors to streamline the production of physical goods, mirroring the agility and simplicity of software development, remains a driving force in the industry.
Freeform, an innovative startup specializing in advanced 3D printing systems for metal components, has successfully secured $67 million in Series B funding. This capital injection, as confirmed by executives to TechCrunch, is earmarked for the significant expansion of its pioneering manufacturing platform.
The investment round saw participation from a distinguished group of backers, including Apandion, AE Ventures, Founders Fund, Linse Capital, NVidia’s NVentures, Threshold Ventures, and Two Sigma Ventures. While Freeform chose not to disclose its post-financing valuation, Pitchbook estimates the company's value at $179 million.
According to CEO and co-founder Erik Palitsch, the new funding will facilitate a crucial upgrade from their existing GoldenEye printing system to a more advanced version, codenamed Skyfall. The GoldenEye system currently employs 18 lasers to precisely fuse metal powders into intricate components. The upcoming Skyfall iteration is projected to dramatically scale capabilities, utilizing hundreds of lasers to produce thousands of kilograms of metal parts daily.
This technological leap represents the realization of a vision initiated in 2018 by Palitsch and co-founder/president Thomas Ronacher. Their collaboration began at SpaceX, where they focused on developing rocket engines. It was there they identified significant shortcomings in industrial metal 3D printing machines, which they found to be costly, temperamental, and ill-suited for high-volume manufacturing.
Freeform was founded with the explicit goal of constructing a manufacturing platform from the ground up, prioritizing superior throughput and adaptability through sophisticated software controls. Palitsch describes Freeform’s platform as “AI native,” highlighting a strategic partnership with Nvidia that grants access to cutting-edge GPUs.
“I think we’re the only quote-unquote manufacturing company out there that has H200 clusters in a data center on site,” Palitsch informed TechCrunch. He elaborated on their application: “What are they doing? We’re running real-time physics-based simulations and learning all the different aspects of the end to end manufacturing workflow.”
The rich data streams generated by sensors embedded within the manufacturing platform, combined with insights from these real-time simulations, empower Freeform to rapidly enhance both the quality and volume of its production.
Cameron Kay, Freeform's head of talent, affirmed the company's data advantage, stating, “We have more meaningful data on the physics of the metal-printing process than any company in the world.”
While Palitsch refrained from naming specific clients, he confirmed that Freeform is actively supplying hundreds of "mission-critical" components to various buyers. The company is now poised for significant expansion, planning to onboard up to 100 new employees and enlarge its facility to address its growing backlog of contracts.
The "Manufacturing-as-a-Service" sector has experienced substantial growth, fueled by increasing venture capital interest in the development of advanced vehicles, robotics, and energy production systems. Notable examples include Hadrian, which recently achieved a $1.6 billion valuation for its automated defense production solutions, and companies like VulcanForms and Divergent, which have collectively raised hundreds of millions to advance their own metal-printing services.
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