Nexa3D is done (and I can finally write about it)

The Atomic Layers: S5E20 (00136)

Atomic Layer of the Day:

Today, a few minutes past 5 PM European time (just after 8 AM in California), Nexa3D sent out an official announcement—they’re shutting down.

Wait! That’s not what they wrote! They’re not shutting down! They’re “scaling back.”

No, hold on... Let’s read this carefully:

“Unfortunately, like many others in our sector, we have faced significant funding challenges that have made it impossible for us to continue operations in their current form, and Nexa3D has taken the necessary steps to scale back accordingly.”

What does this mean, you ask? What is "scaling back"? Let me explain. It means they ran out of money and lost the ability to operate, but the biggest boss in all of AM (I’m speaking figuratively, as he’s the opposite of big physically) can’t admit to it. It’s safe to say this failure has overwhelmed him.

And so, this PR shit was thrown out there—a piece of marketing crap.

I knew they were done since the late summer. They fired anyone they could. What remained was a "skeleton crew." By autumn, only two people were left from the former Essentium team. At Nexa3D, just a handful of management remained—the vast majority of operational staff were gone.

It got to the point of absurdity—the European branch didn’t know whether they should even keep working.

From another source I learned that despite many attempts, no one wanted to buy the Nexa3D. No one wanted to lend the man a helping hand...

Then the CEO of Nexa3D posted this on LinkedIn:

You might ask why he posted it? Why remind the world that he’s working on something other than Nexa3D?

Well, now you know. That was the moment—that was the date.

Next came the embarrassment of Formnext. Nexa3D didn’t show up, unexpectedly. Although Reichental himself was at the fair, taking pictures with people (those who agreed, anyway) and later posting a sad-faced photo on LinkedIn.

Then poor Michael Petch got roped into an interview/statement from Reichental, claiming everything at Nexa3D was fine and that they’d decided long ago not to attend Formnext.

Funny, because one of Formnext’s key managers only found out about their absence the day before the event started! I know this because I asked him myself at the fair.

This week, I got word that the definitive end was coming, though my source feared they’d try to do it quietly. I wrote about it yesterday in NEWS & GOSSIP.

Thankfully—for employees, distributors, and customers—they made it official. But they wrapped it in a garbage statement.

I’m writing this on the fly. I’d nearly finished a completely different article for today (it’ll be published tomorrow), but I’ll return later with a deeper analysis of Nexa3D’s failure.

Finally to be clear:

1. I deeply feel for the employees of Nexa3D and Essentium who worked honestly for their paychecks and to create the best product they could.

2. I feel for the distributors—they’re in a tough spot with their customers now.

3. I feel for the customers—they now own museum pieces.

4. I feel for other companies in the industry who’ll get splattered with Nexa3D’s fallout.

5. I feel for the technology itself—it truly wasn’t bad.

It’s all collateral damage.

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Atomic Layer from the Past:

12-20-2017: Carbon secured $200 million in Series D funding.

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News & Gossip:

1. Markforged founders launch Backflip for text-to-3D modeling - I have a ready text about it, but Nexa3D won. So Backflip will be tomorrow...

2. Axial3D raised $18.2M to create AI-driven medical 3D printing software.

3. Sonja Rasch - Sales Director Manufacturing D/CH at Materialise, is moving to Farsoon Technologies. She has spent the last 11 years at Materialise, and previously worked at HILTI and 3D Systems, among others. I wrote about this in a recent LinkedIn newsletter - Western talent is inexorably migrating to leading Eastern companies.