Weldor CNC is India’sone of the leading manufacturers of sheet metal machines directed by Nikunj Vaghela. Weldor CNC has been in the industry for the last 40 years with an experience in R&D in coach building, refrigeration, steel furniture, control panel manufacturing, and others. The company has been run by the family starting from Mahesh Vaghela and is focusing on boosting the Make in India manufacturing campaign.
3D printing or Additive Manufacturing is a growing market domain in India, but entrepreneurial spirit is ready enough to grab potential in this domain and get a 20% y-o-y growth. One of such highly spirited entrepreneurs is Tejas Diyora, co-founder of Make3D, a 3D printing machine manufacturer based out of Surat, Gujrat. In an exclusive interaction with Machine Maker, Tejas takes us through the rise of Additive Manufacturing technology in India, and the advantages this technology has opened up for the Indian manufacturing industry in terms of improved R&D and product development.
Make3d.in is the brainchild of entrepreneur duo Jatin Goti and Tejas Diyora who wanted to make 3D printing technology available for the country’s manufacturing sector. 3D printing technology or Additive Manufacturing offers great R&D scope, eliminates wastage of raw materials and ensures faster market reach of any product in manufacturing.
Inception of Make3D: Transforming Ideas for Manufacturing
Both Tejas and Jatin graduated from Gujarat Technology University and had an early career start in an R&D facility involved in product development for the diamond industry in Surat. This experience gave them much needed push to bring some of the potentially beneficial technologies for the initial phase of the product development.
Upon observing the great potential the 3D printing technology could open up, they decided to open up a technology startup to the greater part of the manufacturing community. That is how Make3D started its journey in 2014 and was formally registered in 2016. They started their R&D and product prototyping in 2014 itself and after the product was ready, they started to take small steps in the market. Their initial product line was developed for local architecture and the plastic industry.
Challenging Start: Weathering off Challenges
Every start-up goes through its initial phase of a bumpy journey and Make3D was no different. One of the toughest challenges to handle was getting early prototype samples of their product in a small unit. It is not an ideal and cost-effective option for any start-up to get a large unit of product sample without testing the market fast. However, engineering and machinery fabrication units were not ready to accept such a small order of products.
Recalling the experience, Tejas says, “We need our products to be done in state-of-the-art facilities for the best solutions for the laser technology needed in 3D printing machines. They were used to having large units of orders from big customers.” At last one of the engineering facilities accepted their order of 3D printing machines of 200*200 mm capacity. That is how they started their first product line – the Make in India Pratham series.
Tejas mentions that there were other initial start-up challenges as well such as getting skilled manpower, marketing, accounting etc, manpower is the most daunting one. “Initially, no skilled individual wanted in a company with just two founders and ruin the very important time at the start of their career. However, we gradually overcame that challenge and now, we have 25 people working with us.”
The company received the first order of their Additive Manufacturing machine from a local firm. The customer had prior experience with 3D technology. With that came great customer satisfaction feedback and inputs that gradually helped them launch their first product line of the 3D printing product series of Pratham. Now the series consists of a Pratham Mini, particularly suitable for educational institutions to other Pratham products up to 500*500 mm capacity range.
Pratham: Additive Manufacturing Printers on Pan-India Expansion Roll
Pratham got a relatively early start to capture the local additive manufacturing market. However, that is not the only factor that is driving their pan-India growth factor. They have quite a few unique USPs that are addressing the pain points of the growing additive manufacturing market in India accurately. Firstly, they introduced a power failure protection feature in 3D printing machines for the Indian market much ahead of national and international rivals. Because the power supply gap is a pressing challenge in India and 3D printing is a time-consuming process in case of a power failure the whole work has to be re-started.
Secondly, they provide great hand-holding after-sales service including an easily available spare-parts replacement for anyone purchasing their products. They also extend this facility who comes to purchase spare parts. Spare availability has proved them to have a solid customer satisfaction factor and opportunity to approach potential customers. They now have a pan-India customer base.
COVID19: Driving Growth Through Innovative Technology Approach
3D printing technology offered great help in developing emergency essentials such as ventilators, face shields etc. This made people curious about 3d technology. The government also provided support and encouragement to this technology even more. In a way, COVID offered the company a great opportunity for extending its customer base. “We took this opportunity to digitally raise people’s awareness about this relatively new technology in India and its wider benefits.”
They are bringing some of the best innovative brand approaches to extend their customer base from mostly metro-cities to tier 2 and tier 3 cities. They cater to their digital customers with digital product demonstration and logistic working. But manufacturing community is relatively unaware of the particulars of this product. So they built physical demo and experience centres for the customers who want to have detailed product demonstrations in a practical environment. These centres are operated through authorized channel partners.
Currently, Make3d.in is trying to expand industry range in the various sectors from the EKA series to cater to the jewellery sector or 3D printing machine for the initial phase of product development in the manufacturing sector, education sector etc.