Ouch, another one bites the dust

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Stratasys purchased Ultimaker so now adds them to the dead 3D printer business department in Stratasys.

email received today:

Dear customers,

Last year, we announced the merger of Ultimaker and MakerBot, combining the power of two leading 3D printing companies to create one brand to shape the future of manufacturing and product development. Since then, we’ve launched the Sketch Large and S7 3D printers, strengthening our offerings for the educational and professional markets.

Today, we take another step in our brand transformation.

We are happy to share our new brand identity, reflecting UltiMaker’s strategic vision and new brand architecture.

Under the UltiMaker brand, the S and Method series 3D printers will support manufacturing, product development and other professional applications. As one of the world’s most popular professional 3D printers, the S series will continue to offer the widest variety of materials on the market, making it flexible for a multitude of uses, while the Method series will focus on more specific manufacturing applications that can benefit from access to a heated chamber, high-temperature thermoplastic, and a high level of dimensional accuracy.

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Meanwhile, the MakerBot brand will remain operational as a sub-brand within the education sector, with the Sketch series targeted at K-12 learning. With one of the most comprehensive education ecosystems in 3D printing, MakerBot will continue to empower educators and students to take their ideas to the next level.

This new brand architecture is designed to ensure that you can easily find the products and applications best suited to your needs. All UltiMaker hardware and software products are expected to be rebranded over the next 12-18 months.

VISIT ULTIMAKER.COM

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A sad day. :cry: I wonder what will happen to Cura development?

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I did a search on “Stratasys Cura” and found a number of forum discussions of OSS vs “Pro” slicers and the amount of bullsh;t was amazing. Over and over it was mentioned how the “Pro” software from Stratasys produced constant results because you couldn’t change settings. That is moronic to say the least because once you have a well working profile for your machine and slicer it too will produce consistent parts as long as you don’t change it. Then there were all the “professionals” who talked about not having to fiddle with settings was a bonus because their time was expensive. Sorry but I’ve seen too many “professionals” who couldn’t find their way out of a paper bag if they needed to do something outside of the “standard” way they memorized to do things. ie they didn’t really know their product or process, they memorized it.

It is such a pleasure to talk with and explain things to someone well versed in their field and can think on their feet. These are not what I’m seeing in the forum on the pro-Stratasys side.

I’m guessing that if the majority of the developers for Cura were on the Ultimaker payroll then the slicer is likely DOA. If forked and enough devs jump on board it could survive but Stratasys leaves a trail of dead bodies with thread marks on them bearing the Stratasys logo.

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The purchase of Ultimaker was about a year ago and since then they have been making updates to Cura 3D. I didn’t look at the quality or type of updates but their README is just a sales pitch to devs asking if they want to work on Cura or Thingiverse to check the jobs linked in the README file.

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