Daniel O’Connor takes a look at the patents that @MakerBot1 could benefit from now the @Stratasys merger is complete. Which do you think they will implement?
http://bit.ly/14FViGs
The soluble material and filament containers are pretty damn obvious. I don’t think those would hold up in court anyways. Makerbot already sold soluble support material anyways, so it’s been done, see here: http://store.makerbot.com/makerbotr-water-soluble-pva-1kg-spool-1-75mm.html
The most likely benefits are going to be software, because stratasys has a 20 year head-start on it, and heated build chamber.
@ThantiK whether the patents would hold up in court is almost completely irrelevant — even with VC funding Makerbot wasn’t cash rich enough to successfully challenge a patent in court.
Either way, they did both of those patents anyways and were never challenged. Printing with soluble support material and everyone who printed with PVA made containers for them.
@ThantiK the violations could have come up in the negotiations for the merger, though. Who knows whether they knocked off a few million for that.
It’s possible. Something that would have never seen the public eye at all. Just saying…it’s been done already (and is still being done) so it can’t exactly be “the next step”.
Also, it says 5 patents, but only lists 4. I’ve knocked out 2, and another is listed as “unlikely”. I want to know what the 5th one was supposed to be.
This article should be titled “How Stratasys will ruin the DIY spirit of Makerbot”. I am not excited about this at all. The market is too new and technology is moving too fast to start consolidating and locking in consumers into brand silos. This is kinda depressing 
Then dont support them, buy and support open source and other printers. We just need a new community hub that can be an alternate for thingiverse so they cant grip a monopoly.
Thanks for the feedback guys, @ThantiK we originally did four then the 1 patent of MakerBot’s that Stratasys now own, the Automatic Build Plate but three wasn’t enough room to keep it to a single page (750 max on our CMS) so I just hadn’t adjusted the Metadata accordingly.
My worry is really for competition’s sake, MakerBot have such a head start in terms of end consumer (not us makers), they are in Microsoft stores across the US now and have it on good authority that other huge electrical retailers will be following suit very soon.
How is anyone going to be able to compete with the investment MakerBot will now have?
I think the spirit of open source hardware is great and appreciated, but it hasnt been brought to a centralized hub, makers are engaged, creative and inspired, but they are dispersed and dont generally communicate and coordinate on a more global scale like they are able to now.
A Central community for Open Source Hardware, Software and other trades would be a great start. It can begin around 3D printing and expand outward, but I think that would be the best next step, for open source and the DIY movement altogether.
The software and driving electronics will all have to be on the same page anyways, so why not make open source- inspired standards while we’re at it? Everything can run smooth from there.
try http://youmagine.com as an alternative to Thingiverse.