OpenBeam Kossel Pro Moves from Kickstarter to Shopstarter and Beyond
Lake Forest, CA (PRWEB) January 16, 2015 -- The Kossel Pro by OpenBeam enjoyed immense success on Kickstarter where it garnered 189 backers and a total pledge of $122,016. After successfully fulfilling all Kickstarter orders, engineers Terence Tam & Mike Ziomkowski decided to continue taking preorders through Shopstarter. Over the past few months the Shopstarter campaign has taken $62,700 worth of preorders indicating that the demand continues to be strong for this new Kossel printer.
Support and adoption of the Kossel Pro has been high because of the automatic bed leveling and the high end components that make up the kit. The kit was designed so that users can assemble the printer using only the included hex keys which dramatically reduces the build time and complexity associated with assembling the kit. The OpenBeam design of the kit lends itself well to customization and future tweaking which has resonated well with the reprap community. The Kossel Pro was previously the winner of the Editor’s Choice Award at the MakerFaire Bay Area and was the first open hardware 3D printer reviewed by Make Magazine featuring automatic bed levelling.
After successfully taking preorders via Kickstarter and Shopstarter, the Kossel Pro team announced today that all future orders and distribution will be fulfilled by MatterHackers in the USA and Solarbotics in Canada. Team leader Terence Tam stated,
“Today, I am happy to announce that we are taking the next step toward making this a more stable and sustainable company by shutting down our Shopstarter page, and handling all future printer kit sales through our distributors. We would like to welcome MatterHackers and Solarbotics as our launch distribution partners.
Solarbotics had been involved in the educational and robotics market for a very long time – in fact, I still remember visiting the Solarbotics webpage, in its infancy, as one of the first websites I visited when I first got access to the internet, in 1996. MatterHackers, although a much younger company, is an established filament provider, and an active contributor back to the 3D Printing community. You will find MatterHacker’s staff giving lectures at every 3D Printing show, such as the upcoming 3D Printer World Expo in Burbank, CA.
So, with that said, we are shutting down the preorder site on ShopStarter and directing future customers to MatterHackers (US and International) and Solarbotics (Canada, International and Educational Institutions). We are hoping to have kits to each company to ship to customer by the end of March.”
About OpenBeam
OpenBeam is a company dedicated to creating a scaled down, cost reduced, desktop sized version of extruded aluminum framing systems which are commonly used in industry. These systems are ideal for rapidly prototyping and building machinery. Most recently, OpenBeam, in conjunction with Johann Rocholl, developed the groundbreaking Kossel Pro 3D Printer.
About MatterHackers
MatterHackers is your one stop destination for all your 3D printing needs. MatterHackers offers the largest selection of 3D printing filament, supplies, and 3D printers online today. MatterHackers has also developed MatterControl the industry leading 3D printing software application.
About Solarbotics
Solarbotics is a hobby electronics company supplying geek culture in North America for over 20 years. From solar-powered BEAM robotics and Useless Boxes to a Arduino, PICAxe, Atmel and Microchip, we've played many levels of electronics hacking.
Kevin Pope, MatterHackers, http://www.matterhackers.com, +1 (949) 613-5838, [email protected]
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