The history of listed 3D printing companies since the 2022 SPAC crash, quarter by quarter: deals, delistings, bankruptcies and results, each with its sources.
11 posts, newest first
Desktop Metal filed for Chapter 11 117 days after Nano Dimension finished buying it, Nano replaced its CEO and hired bankers, and Velo3D, pushed off the NYSE a year earlier, started trading on Nasdaq again.
A running snapshot of the sector after the consolidation: Nano Dimension selling what it bought, Markforged heading to Stratasys, Velo3D back on Nasdaq, Creality listed in Hong Kong, and Xometry, the one that owns no printers, still growing fastest.
In three weeks of April, Nano Dimension completed both acquisitions, Markforged was delisted, Organovo became VivoSim, and Stratasys closed its Fortissimo rescue. The consolidation of 2023 finally happened, on distressed terms.
The activist-installed board that took over Nano Dimension in December now had to close the Desktop Metal and Markforged acquisitions the old board had signed, while feuding with Desktop Metal over the price.
A court ruling and a shareholder vote handed the activist Murchinson control of Nano Dimension, the CEO was terminated and six directors resigned, all while the company was mid-way through swallowing two competitors.
In one quarter Nano Dimension agreed to buy both Desktop Metal and Markforged, and Velo3D was pushed off the NYSE onto the over-the-counter market. Consolidation and collapse in the same three months.
The quarter the boardroom fight at cash-rich Nano Dimension spilled into open letters. Murchinson wanted the CEO and board gone; the company was about to spend its cash on acquisitions instead.
A quiet quarter with one real casualty: voxeljet gave up its Nasdaq listing to cut costs, an early sign that for the smaller names the question had shifted from growth to survival.
The year the biggest 3D printing companies spent more energy trying to buy each other than selling printers: Nano Dimension, Stratasys, 3D Systems and Desktop Metal, and a shareholder vote that killed the whole thing.
The year the blank-cheque money ran out. Desktop Metal, Markforged, Velo3D and the rest had gone public at high valuations in 2020 and 2021; in 2022 most of it evaporated, and Nano Dimension quietly loaded the gun for the 2023 takeover war.
After two years of fending off takeovers, Stratasys took a 120 million dollar investment from Fortissimo Capital. It steadied the balance sheet, and it quietly made a private-equity firm the largest shareholder ahead of Nano Dimension.