UpNano GmbH (Vienna, Austria) today unveiled the world’s first 2-photon polymerization (2PP) 3D printer built for industrial mass production of microparts – the NanoPro VT. Presented at the international trade fair, Formnext, in Frankfurt, Germany, the new high-performance printer is the engine that powers the company’s new NanoPro service, offering high-volume production of microparts for industrial manufacturing processes – something that hasn’t been achievable until now. The machine uses extremely efficient and cost-effective mechanisms, finally allowing 2PP 3D printing of polymeric microparts at a mass-production scale. Offered as a fully integrated service, the use of the NanoPro VT marks the beginning of a new era for industry.
Due to its extraordinary precision, rapid and flexible prototyping using 2PP 3D printers has revolutionized the development processes in many industries thus far. However, relatively long production times and available materials have limited its use to prototyping and batch production. For many years, the focus of innovation has been to speed up the production process while increasing the resolution range and use of materials. No one has excelled at this more than Austria’s UpNano GmbH, who five years ago launched the highest performing 2PP 3D printer on the market – the NanoOne, employed by industry and high-end research institutions around the world. Building on this acclaimed success, their R&D department continued to optimize the performance of the technology further, culminating in the NanoPro VT.
Bernhard Küenburg, CEO of UpNano at the launch event: “With the development of the NanoPro VT, UpNano is now in the position to offer the first fully integrated 2PP based service for industrial microparts. With over 20 years of experience in 2PP technology, our team is available to collaborate closely with customers to deliver tailored solutions from design via prototyping to serial production including delivery worldwide.”
From Rapid Prototyping to Rapid Production
With the launch of the NanoPro service, UpNano offers an excellent solution for unmet needs in industrial microfabrication. The highest resolution and tolerance combined with unmatched throughput facilitates the scalable production of innovative and complex designs. In fact, the technical capabilities of the newly developed NanoPro VT are impressive: The firepower of the patented printing system enables a performance of 32 Megavoxels (million volume pixels) per second compared to projection-based technologies (DLP) at only two Megavoxels in about 3-10 seconds. Depending on the configuration, this translates into a throughput of several thousand mm3 per hour, many factors higher than any other 2PP technology currently on the market.
“This outstanding performance”, explains Peter Gruber, CTO of UpNano, “makes it possible to print a million identical parts, or a million parts with individual modifications. In addition, the resolution of the printer allows structures and tolerances below 100 nm. The ability to print the entire surface of 200x200mm substrates is also unique. An automatic lens changer increases flexibility and enables optimized production cycles with the extremely robust NanoPro VT, which operates under ISO 5 cleanroom conditions, is temperature-stable and vibration-isolated.”
Scalable Solution for Growing Challenges
The NanoPro service enters the market at a time when the miniaturization of production parts has often reached the limits of existing technologies such as DLP, μSLA, SLA, MIM or FDM. Designs are getting increasingly intricate and complex while production tolerances are getting more stringent. In addition, the global economy is driving fierce competition, making economy of scale through high-volume production even more necessary than ever. NanoPro offers scalable solutions that can’t be found elsewhere on the market. On top of its technical competencies, UpNano is ISO 9001 and 14001 certified, ensuring that any service offered fulfills the latest industry and environmental standards.
Performance Printing as a Service
Bernhard Küenburg sums up: “In essence, the service we now offer reduces costs for customers by eliminating the need for clean room facilities, post-processing equipment, metrology, and inspection. On top of that, NanoPro also stands for continuous development. While we already offer state-of-the-art production technologies today, the platform will continue to set new standards in the future. The NanoPro service means dedicated partnership, guaranteed excellence, and continuous innovation.” Owners of the desktop version of UpNano’s 2PP 3D-printers, the NanoOne series, can perform the initial steps of designing and prototyping in-house, with support from UpNano experts, before seamlessly transferring their designs to serial production at UpNano via NanoPro. UpNano recently launched a new model in the NanoOne series, the NanoOne green, which is now the improved printing platform to prototype parts for NanoPro due to its green 515 nm wavelength laser which is the same used in the NanoPro VT. This new wavelength offers over 30% higher precision compared to a 780 nm laser wavelength and the ability to work with a broader range of standard and transparent materials. With the introduction of NanoPro as a new fully integrated service offering, UpNano expands its state-of-the-art solutions within the manufacturing industry. In addition to NanoPro, UpNano continues to offer the NanoOne series of printers, resins for various applications, and an advanced software package. All of which are already widely in use in industry and research around the world.
