It is becoming more and more clear to me that SGLB is well-entrenched in one of the most vital areas of AM, if not the very most critical path. Say what you will about revenues (not much to say), working with organizations like Siemens, Pratt & Whitney, NIST, LZN, EOS, etc is not the type of thing that someone with a garbage product is able to do more than once or twice, even in a fantasy world.
The "America Makes" report from GE painted a dismal picture, yet SGLB continues to work with everyone in that circle, with the likely exception of GE. Word gets around, and industries like this tend to be a pretty small circle where people hear a good deal about what others are doing, at least on the surface. I find it telling that SGLB filed their patent application ONE DAY before GE. I am overstepping my bounds with this speculation, but I think there was a professional courtesy from someone at GE with a conscience who let SGLB know that things had gotten less friendly, and that Sigma better move.
It is entirely possible that Sigma wont get their patents and GE Additive, EOS, Stratonics, or someone else will develop some similar technology that gets a greater market share, but that doesnt rule SGLB out by any means. SGLB seems to very much have developed a technology that, at the very least, has a ton of potential. Where are the partnerships between GE, EOS, Stratonics, etc with organizations like NIST and LZN? These organizations set the standards - not the industry - with things that are highly-regulated, like passenger flight. There is room for more than one player in this space, especially if the other major players are groups like GE or EOS, who would be too vertically-integrated to be desirable or trustworthy inspection partners for the rest of the industry.
