Educational 3D Printing: The Future of 3D Printing Stocks

“Edtech” is not an everyday term, but by many accounts it’s going to be the buzzword of the future.
Edtech is a combination of education and technology, and it refers to the multitude of ways that tech is impacting and innovating education. Although the term suggests a niche focus, nearly all the major tech companies have a presence in this market.
Take Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), for instance. The company has joined US President Barack Obama in support of the ConnectEd initiative, committing its products and knowledge to 114 schools across the US. According to Apple, that is “an important first step and a bold vision for a richer, more diverse, and more inclusive future.” Meanwhile, companies like Google (NASDAQ:GOOGL) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) create, produce and distribute classroom hardware and software. 
Here’s a brief look at how 3D printing companies are getting ready for a revolution in education.

Edtech the future of 3D printing stocks

Innovative 3D printing companies like Tinkerine Studios (TSXV:TTD) are recognizing the connection between classroom education and tech innovation, and building products that address this need. Tinkerine, which listed on the TSX Venture Exchange nearly a year ago, is a developer and manufacturer of high-performance 3D printers and a creator and distributor of 3D educational tools, content and materials.
Furthermore, Tinkerine is the supplier of Tinkerine U, the world’s first comprehensive STEAM-based (science, technology, engineering, art and math) training and content platform. This product serves an $86-billion educational technology market and a $122-billion online training market, demonstrating the clear demand for edtech-related products and services.
Speaking to the Investing News Network, Tinkerine CEO Eugene Suyu explained, “it’s all about agile design thinking, creative problem solving and skill sets that allow for education to tie into real-world practices. With 3D printing we can focus more efforts on creative skill sets, design iterations and quick turnovers for bringing an idea to life and using it to solve some big problems.”
For Suyu, 3D printing is a particularly apt medium for educational needs. He commented that “3D printing has a very interesting characteristic, and that is the ability to fail a thousand times, succeed once and feel like you’ve won a million times. This is all done through the iterative process — what we defined traditionally as failures are just part of the process.” He continued, “in the real world, this is how things are, and in the 21st century our ability to quickly problem solve is key to our successes for any sector.”

Potential hurdles

Like all sectors, 3D printing in the classroom is facing barriers to widespread adoption. According to a report from Sophic Capital, one of these barriers is the fact that most teachers aren’t early adopters of technology. The majority of educators don’t know how to use 3D printing, which makes it difficult to incorporate into the classroom. Furthermore, little content exists to develop 3D printing curricula, which means the additional burden of requiring teachers to create it for themselves.
Finally, many teachers just don’t have an interest in learning a new technology at later stages of their careers. Martin Stevens, CEO of It Is 3D, a UK-based 3D technology company for education, has said, “…you have 20% [of teachers] at the other end of the curve, who say ‘I’m going to be retiring in the next fifteen years, I don’t have time to learn this.’”
That is where Tinkerine U comes in — as mentioned, it’s an educational service for familiarizing individuals with 3D printing. When asked about the timeline for widespread adoption of 3D printing in an educational context, Suyu was confident. He said that “the timeline for this will really depend on both private and public sector investment into the technology. It isn’t unlike what we saw for computers when they were introduced, and it will be progressive transformation over the next five years.”
Thus, investors who want to see progress in the area of classroom 3D printing should consider investing. The large market and significant demand suggest that this a strong area of investment, even if there are some initial challenges to incorporating 3D printing into the curriculum.
 
Securities Disclosure: I, Morag McGreevey, hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article.