AstroPrint announces free service for Hospitals and Universities during the COVID-19 crisis

Dear AstroPrinters and 3D Printing community,

Now more than ever we are dedicated to providing you with the best service possible. We decided last week to temporarily close our offices for the safety of our employees during the C19 crisis. However, you should know that we are staying 100% operational. We are lucky enough to be able to fully operate via remote working and we are still 100% dedicated to offering you the same quality of service we always do.

  • Our team is still available for support
  • Our service is still operating at full capacity
  • We are still focused on helping you get the most out of your 3D Printers
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Press Release: Universities and K-12 Schools to Start Beta Testing AstroPrint’s 3D Printing Platform for Education

AstroPrint Press Release – For Immediate Release – October 16, 2019

Hartford, Connecticut – (October 16, 2019)  AstroPrint is launching a bespoke version of it’s popular 3D Printer Management Platform for Universities, K-12 schools and other education institutions, aimed at making 3D printing more accessible to students, increasing the efficiency of school fleets, and reducing related costs in staffing and resources.

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AstroPrint Secures Second Round of Funding to Expand our Business and Enterprise Solutions

Press Release: For Immediate Release

We’ve just concluded a very successful second funding round where AstroPrint raised a total of $1M from two prominent VCs: Stanley Ventures and Alma Mundi Ventures. With this new investment, AstroPrint has raised a total of $2.1M, and we are now poised to grow our 3D printing cloud solution that already serves over 95k users from 130 countries.

Who are the Investors?

Stanley Ventures is the venture capital arm of Fortune 500 company Stanley Black & Decker. Stanley Ventures has invested in several companies in the additive manufacturing space, including an investment in a new Selective Thermoplastic Electrophotographic Process (STEP) 3D printing technology.

Alma Mundi Ventures is a tech venture fund based in Madrid with investors in Palo Alto, New York, London, Paris, Barcelona, and Madrid, orchestrating a global network of over 500 members in 41 cities worldwide. Their investments are primarily global tech startups in the United States and in Europe.

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TinkerCAD and AstroPrint, Together at Last!

We’re happy to announce the AstroPrint integration with Tinkercad is finally live! This has been one of the most requested features on the AstroPrint platform from schools, students, and STEM teachers! And now it’s here!

The Basics

This gives students the ability to do EVERYTHING from 3D model creation => 3D Printing, in the CLOUD. Tinkercad allows them to 3D design in the cloud, and AstroPrint manages 3D Printing of those designs in the cloud.

Tinkercad users can now export their 3D designs directly into their AstroPrint account, right from Tinkercad. Of course, they can then start the 3D Printing process from within AstroPrint.

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How Enterprises can Reduce Costs and get 20X Output in Additive Manufacturing

We often get asked how a system like AstroPrint can save an Enterprise so much money, while dramatically increasing Additive Manufacturing output.  This article will explore one of the primary ways we can do exactly this.

Let’s start with understanding how most Enterprises buy 3D Printers:  In most organizations, an engineer requests a 3D Printer for themselves, or a department.  After lots of bureaucracy, they get this approved and the purchasing process can begin. Being a large organization, they reach out to a public company such as Stratasys or 3D Systems and enter the Enterprise sales cycle of these organizations.  They then go on to purchase a high end 3D Printer with a service contract and advanced (paid) software package to manage the printer.

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AstroPrint Launches Cura 3 Slicing Functionality in the AstroPrint Cloud

AstroPrint ❤️’s Cura 3

First and foremost, we would like to thank Ultimaker & the Cura Open Source Community for creating and open sourcing this slicing engine!

Cura 3 functionality (more specifically, Cura Slicing Engine v3.6.0) is now integrated into the AstroPrint Cloud!  (a week BEFORE Ultimaker is expected to launch it in the new Ultimaker Cloud!)

This means that AstroPrint users can now choose Cura 3.6.0 as their base slicing engine for all of their prints.  Also, 3D Printer Manufacturers can now choose Cura 3.6.0 as the default slicing engine for all of their customers that use the AstroPrint software platform.

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Stanley Black and Decker Partners with AstroPrint to Create a Distributed Network of 3D Printers

AstroPrint Press Release – For Immediate Release – March 13, 2019

Stanley Black & Decker Partners with AstroPrint to Create a Distributed Network of 3D Printers

Hartford, Connecticut – (March 13, 2019)  Today, AstroPrint is announcing a partnership with Stanley Black & Decker (NASDAQ: SWK) to connect, control, and optimize their fleet of 3D printers across multiple facilities. With AstroPrint’s Enterprise Cloud, Stanley Black & Decker will effortlessly automate their Additive Manufacturing systems and workflows on a single platform, ensuring that resources are properly shared and optimized, while gaining actionable intelligence on productivity and growth opportunities.

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How MetalMaker 3D is using AstroPrint to Disrupt the $200B Metal Casting Industry

Lots of innovators are using AstroPrint to power their startup businesses, but none more innovative than the good folks at MetalMaker 3D.

About MetalMaker 3D

MetalMaker 3D has created a mini Foundry system that quickly and easily produces cast-metal parts that do not have the limitations of 3D Printed metal.  MetalMaker 3D parts are dramatically cheaper, faster, and stronger that parts made from traditional metal Additive Manufacturing processes. (more…)

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Press Release: AstroPrint Integrates the 3D Slash App, Creating a User-Friendly 3D Platform for Mainstream Users

Press Release

ASTROPRINT INTEGRATES THE 3D SLASH APP,
CREATING A USER-FRIENDLY 3D PLATFORM FOR MAINSTREAM USERS

San Diego, CA and Paris, France, August 11, 2015 – AstroPrint, the cloud 3D printing software platform and 3D Slash, the fun and easy-to-use 3D modeling app, announced their partnership today. The combination of these two user-friendly services will provide all users with an engaging and efficient 3D experience.

Free your mind from complex 3D parameters: AstroPrint and 3D Slash collaborate to offer a simple and intuitive 3D experience, accessible both from PC and mobile devices. Users can now easily create, remix, slice, monitor and 3D print anything, anytime, from anywhere.

A great 3D experience for all users
AstroPrint and 3D Slash both offer smart plug & play tools to anyone wishing to work in 3D trouble-free. With this partnership, users can directly access the 3D Slash modeling app from the AstroPrint dashboard. (more…)

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AstroPrint Tip 5 (of 5): To Infinity and Beyond – Wireless 3D Printing

This is part of our Getting Started series that our space monkeys email to new users.

Greetings AstroPrint-er,

This is the final tip in your Getting Started series for AstroPrint. Don’t be sad the tips are ending, be happy you are now a 3D printing expert! 😉

Tip 5:  To Infinity and Beyond!  Now that you’re hooked on 3D printing, let’s make you a 3D printing rockstar! It’s time to start 3D printing with your phone, tablet, or remote computer.

To print wirelessly, your 3D printer will need to be cloud enabled. Luckily to enable most 3D printers you simply need to plug an AstroBox into it. There are two ways you can get an AstroBox:

  • Pick one up online, here.
  • Make one yourself out of a Raspberry Pi. The AstroBox software for the RPi is totally free, but you’ll have to buy a few pieces of hardware. This is just for techies, and instructions can be found here.

Setup of the AstroBox is incredibly simple, check out this video to see how its done.

Learn More About the AstroBox

What can you do with a wireless enabled 3D printer, you ask?

  • Start and stop prints from any web enabled device (phone, tablet, remote computer).
  • Remote Monitoring of prints (requires a web camera).
  • Share timelapses of your prints to FB and YouTube.
  • Ability to start prints directly from the internet, and certain websites.
  • And much more.

Thanks for following our Getting Started tips! Please let us know if you found these tips helpful, awesome, boring, and/or terrible! Simply reply to this email to let us know.  :–)

We’ll see you on the AstroPrint Mothership!

The AstroPrint Team

 

Other tips in this series:

Tip 1: Fuel Up! – Getting Started with 3D Designs

Tip 2: Prepare to Launch – Slicing and Advanced Settings

Tip 3: Take Off – All the ways to print with AstroPrint

Tip 4: The Space Station – All about 3D Printing Apps

Tip 5: To Infinity and Beyond – Wireless 3D Printing

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