Whatever your challenge or interest — from school projects to that vexing home repair to a customized toy or avatar — Desktop Factory will cause the creative disruption of the manufacturing value chain, enabling each of us to personally manufacture what we need, when we need it. Desktop Factory prints 3-D solid objects from traditional CAD software, the variety of new low-cost or free CAD programs aimed toward the consumer, 3-D scanners and/or 3-D objects that are downloaded from websites, such as Turbo Squid, DAZ, etc. IdeaLab was founded by dot.com entrepreneur Bill Gross. This product received a 2007 Best of What's New award from Popular Science.
— “Our intent is to reduce the costs over time, delivering a model below $1000 by 2011,” an enthusiastic Cathy Lewis, CEO of Desktop Factory, told TDmonthly. “Contemplate the creative talent that will be unleashed when each of us has a 3-D printer. Imagine, too, the enormous reduction in greenhouse gas emissions when we alter the current manufacturing pipeline!” Launch date: 3Q 2008.