08-02-2016: 3DPrint.com revealed that the announced 2014 sale of 5,000 3D printers to DELL by Zortrax never happened
Poland’s 3D printing industry was built upon a lie
On August 2, 2016, Michael Molitch-Hou published a prominent article on 3DPrint.com in which he revealed that the famous contract between Zortrax and DELL for the delivery of 5,000 3D printers never came to fruition. This information resonated widely across all industry media as well as in Zortrax's home country, Poland, where it was covered by major business newspapers. Following this, more facts began to emerge. How is this story viewed today?
To recap—in January 2014, Zortrax announced the signing of a contract with DELL to supply 5,000 3D printers. Polish Centrum Druku 3D was the first to report this information. It caused a significant stir worldwide and effectively launched the company's international career. In March of the same year, the information about the contract was included in the prospectus for the sale of bonds, which raised a total of 6 million PLN (~1.4 million EUR).
Shortly thereafter, Zortrax ceased any communication about the contract, limiting themselves to vague statements such as "everything is proceeding according to plan" or "the terms of the contract prevent us from disclosing details of its execution."
For two and a half years, the contract with DELL remained a taboo topic. Increasingly, people began to suspect that it had never actually materialized, but no one had any proof to confirm this. That changed with Molitch-Hou's article, which revealed that the contract never existed and that Zortrax's entire international career was based on a brazen lie.
A few days later, John Biggs from TechCrunch published an official denial from DELL that any agreement had been signed with Zortrax, along with excerpts from his conversations with the founder, Rafał Tomasiak. In April 2014, which Tomasiak assured him that the contract was in place, while simultaneously avoiding providing any proof that he was telling the truth.
That was August 2016. What happened next? Well, in Poland, there was some outrage, but then it was largely dismissed as not a big deal. One of Poland's leading investors even stated that this was the way to do business (quote: "fake it until you make it"). Globally, few people mentioned it after two years, and after the C19 pandemic, it was largely forgotten.
At the same time, the pandemic caused significant problems for Zortrax, which manufactured its 3D printers in China. After the lockdown, deliveries were severely restricted. The war in Ukraine exacerbated this issue (the trade route from China to Poland passes through Russia and Ukraine). No deliveries = no sales = no money. With fixed overhead costs = debts.