UPDATED 07:30 EDT / MAY 17 2018

EMERGING TECH

Startup Arevo lands $12.5M to bring 3-D printing into the mainstream

3-D printing startup Arevo Inc. aims to kickstart a revolution in manufacturing after signing on a new high-profile chief executive officer and closing a $12.5 million funding round.

Arevo offers some pretty advanced 3-D printing capabilities, using a combination of software, robotics and materials to manufacture a range of lightweight products that boast “superior strength and unlimited size.”

The company said it can do this thanks to its proprietary True 3-D software algorithm, which can optimize the placement of the fibers that make up its products in “true 3-D” orientations for more strength. The result is production parts that have “unique characteristics that cannot be made with conventional manufacturing techniques,” the company said.

One of the company’s most recent creations was what it says is the world’s “first true 3-D printed commuter bike,” which it developed in partnership with a firm called Studio West. The bike sports a reimagined form factor that removes a seat stay between the seat and the back wheel, making the design simpler and also stronger and more durable, the company said.

Arevo is now being led by new Chief Executive Jim Miller, an ex-Amazon.com Inc. executive who previously served as its vice president of supply chain, helping to lead its transition away from books, music and video to “full-range fulfillment capabilities.” More recently, Miller served at Google Inc. as its vice president of worldwide operations, working on the infrastructure that powers services such as search, YouTube and Gmail.

“Arevo is at an exciting inflection point in its business right now,” Miller said in a statement following his appointment. “We have the technology, team and tools to commercialize our software and fabrication process to build high-strength parts that the manufacturing industry hasn’t been able to conceive and construct before.”

Asked about what attracted him to Arevo in the first place, Miller rather ambitiously stated that he believes the company has the potential to scale in a fashion similar to his previous employers.

“I believe Arevo has tremendous potential to be a game-changer in the way that parts and structures are fabricated,” Miller told SiliconANGLE. “We use many aspects of traditional 3-D printing, for example localization of the supply chain, economical one-off part fabrication. But our material and fabrication process allow us to move beyond part prototyping to fabrication of production-strength parts.”

With Miller safely ensconced at his new desk, the company said it has just closed on a $12.5 million Series B round of funding round led by Asahi Glass, with participation from Leslie Ventures, Khosla Ventures and Sumitomo Corporation of Americas. The company plans to use the money to break into new manufacturing industries, with a focus on the aerospace, defense, transportation, automotive, consumer electronics and oil and gas, among others. Of course that will be no easy feat for a startup with limited resources such as Arevo, but Miller told SiliconANGLE he was confident it could be done.

“Arevo is a startup with limited bandwidth, so focusing our resources is critical,” Miller said. “We have to carefully select which applications and partners are best suited for our technology. That said, 2018 is all about scaling our team, production and software. We feel confident that we can continue to scale to meet increasing demand for our product.”

“Arevo’s approach is a significant leap forward as it is truly 3-D printing rather than stacked 2-D printing, which is what most of us are accustomed to,” said Vinod Khosla of Khosla Ventures. “Arevo can finally move 3-D printing beyond novelty applications and into a mainstream manufacturing necessity with its unique nexus of software, robotics and composite materials.”

Image: krzysztof-m/Pixabay

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