Source: VELO3D
Sapphire AM Printer
New investors Piva, a San Francisco-based venture capital firm, and TNSC joined the round, along with existing investors Bessemer Venture Partners, Playground, and Khosla Ventures.
VELO3D, headquartered in Silicon Valley and founded five years ago, has now raised $138m in financing in total. The new funding, which comes during a time when global manufacturing has slowed due to the coronavirus pandemic, will be used to expand VELO3D’s product portfolio to include more machine options, compatible alloys, and enhanced software and hardware capabilities.
“With the VELO3D integrated solution of Flow™ advanced pre-print software, Sapphire™ printer, and Assure™ quality management software, companies can finally break free of the constraints of existing metal additive manufacturing processes,” said Benny Buller, Founder and CEO of VELO3D.
“Customers in industries such as aerospace, oil and gas, and power generation are now able to achieve part quality for their mission-critical applications with performance levels that weren’t possible before with 3D metal printing.”
VELO3D signed an exclusive distribution agreement with TNSC in December 2019. As part of that deal, TNSC represents VELO3D in Japan through sales and service of VELO3D‘s integrated solution of hardware and software – the Sapphire® machine, Flow™ pre-print preparation software, and Assure™ quality control and assurance software.
Buller said in December, “Our mission is to enable OEMs in our key market verticals to gain trust in 3D metal printing as a dependable manufacturing technology. Our end-to-end solution enables users to adopt additive manufacturing without extensive redesign, increasing the viability of 3D metal printing of existing parts. We believe TNSC is the best representative of this message in Japan, based on their unique expertise in welding processes, heat treatment and gas optimisation.”
In the first year of commercialisation of the Sapphire printer in 2019, VELO3D generated nearly $30m in sales and gained seven new customers, according to VELO3D.
Piva is the largest investor in the new round and has a strong heritage in industrial markets, as they are backed by Malaysia-based PETRONAS.