#243 SecurePrint3D founder Ranjith Gopalakrishnan on building the infrastructure for distributed AM

Hello and welcome to additive insight, the original additive manufacturing podcast and your source for news, interviews and comments on related 3D printing and AM intelligence, brought to you by TCT magazine. I'm your host Sam Davis and today I'm drawn by Secureprint 3D founder Ranjeev Kapala Krishnan. To cureprint 3D was founded last year and has been granted a patent for a hardware-enforced print authorization technology that it believes can help to facilitate the implementation of distributed additive manufacturing. Distributed manufacturing has long been considered a concept that AM can enable, but several barriers remain, including the authorization gap. Though still at an early stage, Kapala Krishnan joins the additive insight podcast to explain the capabilities of the hardware-enforced print authorization technology, where it fits in the existing AM landscape and how far along the company is on its commercialization journey. He also provides insight into initial research discovery and outlines what successful look like for the company. If you liked your hair, don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can also head over to tctmagadine.com to subscribe to the TCT membership platform and receive more additive insight via our print and digital offerings. Ramjeev, welcome to the additive insight podcast. To start today, can you share more about your background and how you came into the world of 3D printing and additive manufacturing? Thank you for inviting me to your podcast. So I came to this on the problem of the technology. My background isn't the enterprise software and commercialization. They painted the patent I kept to pen-conferring across industries was how execution level authorization had been solved everywhere. Steaming software, gaming. But 3D printing had been left entirely behind as distributive additive manufacturing behind scaling more content facilities, more design files, leaving OEM was. I saw a structural control gap that nobody had addressed technically. The gap sits inside a global 3D printing market valued at 18.6 billion in 2024, growing at 26.2% HCI towards 76.2 billion by 2030. The problem grows proportionally with every node added to a distributed network. I and my partner invented the hardware enforcement mechanism. My role as a CMO and commercialization has been to validate the problem at scale, map the market and build the commercialization path, which included 28 discovery conversations with engineers and operations managers to contract manufacturers across aerospace, automotive and medical device manufacturing. In the percentage of these practitioners who acknowledge the problem, not one mentioned a technical solution. That was the confirmation we needed to rule. OK, so we'll come on to talk about your patented technology shortly. But let's start with the challenge. So additive manufacturing, it's long been suggested, provides this opportunity for distributed manufacturing. I think it would be fair to say that concept hasn't been implemented perhaps as widely as many would have fought by now. So from your perspective, what are the barriers in the way of companies and organizations adopting these distributed manufacturing concepts at large? Several barriers. But the one that is least discussed most foundational is the authorization gap. Distributed additive manufacturing requires trust. That facility will run exactly the number of parts authorized right now. That trust is entirely contractual and reputation. There is no technical enforcement layer at the printer to understand the scale of what it is at stake. Counterfeiting and IP theft costs manufacturers over $500 billion annually globally. Cost shortages and supply chain disruptions of the kind exposed by COVID-19 cost manufacturers more than $50 billion in annual down. For distributed additive manufacturing to actually observe these costs, OEM needs a technical guarantee that their files are protected when they leave the building. Today, the guarantee does not exist. The other barriers, material qualification, process consistency, regulatory certifications or real and the industry is actively working on them. But IP control is different, it is structural and unlike material science which improves gradually the IP exposure compounds with K. Every new contract node you add is another point of potential over and with zero technical visibility. What our discovery research showed is that practitioners know this acuity in 28 conversations. 100% actually the problem. Zero mentioned a technical prevention layer. The industry has accepted it as unsolvable. So in a distributed network, the idea is you have manufacturing capability in several locations. As I think you've touched on every new node of a distributed network is a point of exposure. So as I think stand today, is it your opinion that distributed AM is basically incompatible with IP protection? Are you saying that you could never be 100% sure that your distributed network would not be compromised in an IP sense? Fantastic question. As things stand today, yes, effectively, not because the technology cannot solve it, it's because the implementation has never been built for additive manufacturing. The hardware exists, the architecture is proven in other industries, but nobody has applied it here until now. What that means in practice is that every OEM running a distributed AM program has made a calculated risk decision. They are betting on contracts, NDEs, supplier, waiting and relationships for established domestic partners. The works most of the time, but as the network extent of short manufacturing distributed spare part programs military field printing the calculus changes. They cannot enforce a contract across a dozen time zones with the same confidence as a facility down the road. Constable is actually building the distributed additive manufacturing networks right now. It is the aerospace primes, the defense contractors, automotive OEMs. We have identified 15 aerospace prime contractors as priority targets, including Boeing, Lockheed Martin, RTX, Nautro, Gruman and the GE Aerospace. We have 63 verified decision makers contacts across these companies. And across all four verticals, we are targeting aerospace, automotive, industrial machinery and 3D printer OEMs. We have 812 qualified prospects. Every one of them is managing this risk today with no technical backstop. You founded SecureOprint 3D last year, as you have said in the company. As you have mentioned, you have had 28 discovery conversations through online channels, direct interviews of engineers, operations managers, contract managers. As you said before, 100% of these people identify the problem, 0% know or could identify or point towards the solution. In addition to that, knowing that you are applying your effort in the right area because nobody knows how to solve this problem, what have you learnt from those conversations with those professionals? Yeah, the finding that took stock to me was this. 100% of respondents acknowledged the problem was real. Not a single one mentioned a technical solution unprotec. In 28 conversations across six communities and direct interviews, aerospace, automotive, medical device, contract and manufacturing, the industry had universally accepted this as an unsolvable problem. The default solution were always the same contracts, NDAs, repetitions and trust. One machine shop operator put it directly, what stops them from over printing is being reputable under contract and funny enough not having time. There's always a new project already lined up so busyness as a controlled mechanism. That is the state of IP protection in additive manufacturing today. The most sobering data point came from a print shop owner who confirmed an actual first and account of client data being stored. and not suspected it is confirmed. The response from the community was fatalistic. There is no technical banks or so reputation and market conditions are the only detroit. Geography flags immediately as elevated risk. Five of 28 respondents specifically cited overseas facilities and the findings sits inside a much larger market reality. The global partner friends, parts market affected by this problem exceeds $500 billion annually or 225 identified priority companies span all four target verticals 25 aerospace defense prime contractors 35 automotive tire one oeums and 150 plus industrial machinery manufacturers and 32 3D printing the bringo oeums, genetic, glazed, and circuits. In our exchanges prior to set up this interview, you remarked that 3D printing is the only production technology where the execution environment has zero awareness of authorization and you know how Netflix for example controls playback and Adobe controls activations from the execution environment rather than the content. So in in addition manufacturing, what is the consequence of that gap? What why does that pose challenges to the users of AM? Yeah, the consequence is that authorization exists one day on paper. When Netflix sends you a film, the player validates are token before the first frame plays. The file can be on your hard drive. It does not matter. The execution environment will not run it without a live authorization signal. Adobe Steam, every modern software platforms works the same way 3D printing works the opposite way. The g code file contains all instructions the printer needs. Once it is in the machine, the machine has no concept of how many times it has to be run before whether the quantity matches the purchase order, whether the facility is authorized or whether the time window has expired. The file is the only control and the file can be copied, saved, and read at 2 a.m. with no reconstruction place. The security consequence is severe here. FDA 21FCFR Part 820 requires documented manufacturing controls and traceability for every medical device. FAA and DOD, compliance frameworks require complete audit trials for production parts. ITAR governs design fines for classified defense components. None of those requirements can be met technically today because the printer itself keeps no variable record. The OEM has a contract, the facility has a printer, the printer remembers nothing. The market consequence is that the manufacturers who care most about their IP protection will not send their highest value fine outside their own buildings precisely because of this gap. That is the ceiling on distributed additive manufacturing adoption today. Lift the ceiling and you can unlock a market that has been theoretically available but practically inaccessible. You've recently been granted a US patent on the technology, the hardware and force print authorization technology. Can you explain how that technology works and I guess how impactful you think it can be within the additive manufacturing landscape? The patent is actually utility granted by a patent on April 1st, 2025. The tightly is system and method for a 3D printer with one time use files. It is only issued, it is the only issued US patent providing hardware enforced DRM specifically for 3D printing. The mechanism works in four phases. In the software configuration phase, the system assigns a unique 16 digit machine ID to the designated printer, creates a modified OBJ design file, embedding the machine ID authorized print count and part details and generates a unique 16 digit file ID for this specific job. In the encryption phase, that modified OBJ is exported as an encrypted snap print G5, locked cryptography to that one machine and that one authorized quantity. In the decryption and validation phase, when the G5 is introduced to the printer, the printer checks the embedded machine ID against its own registered ID and checks the file ID against its database of previously used IDs. Both must please. If either fails, the printer displays not valid and hearts. No already existed the user level. In the printing and storage phase, the job executes for exactly the authorized number of parts and the file ID is permanently stored to prevent any re-exegution. The impact is structural. The 10 year licensing NPV across our 225 identified target companies is projected at 7.24 billion at a discount rate of 8%. The full annual royalty potential at the market penetration is $760 million. The break even on the licensing program is 14 months. The five year cumulative revenue projection on the strategic licensing path is 3.25 billion. But the numbers I find more compelling are the operational ones for manufacturing, manufacturing running 1000 or more skews, implementation delivers 70 to 80 percentage reduction in inventory carrying cost and 95 percentage reduction in lead time and 90 percentage reduction in shipping and logistics cost with a 12 to 18 month payback period and 100 percentage elimination of unauthorized parts, not reduction complete elimination. Because hardware will not run and unauthorized file and there is no way pass at all. One sector seems to be progressing well with the distributed AM concept is the defense sector. In defense, obviously, they're going to want to put printers in remote locations and those printers therefore might not always be able to reach a server. How does your technology work for an environment like that? This is one of the most important deployment scenarios for the technology and the architecture handles it directly. The authorization token is issued before the job travels to the remote facility. It is cryptographically signed and logged to that specific printer's mission ID. Once issued, the token requires no live server connection to validate. The validation happens locally at the printer using the hardware level secure element. Think of it like a boarding pass. The validation happens at issuance when the airline checks your identity and issues the signed pass. At the gate, this cannot check the pass, not the airline's central database in real time. The security is in the signed credential, not the network connection. Our token works the same way. You issue it at a secure facility in the continental US, send it with the design fine to a forward deployed location with no connectivity and naval vessel, a forward operating base, an austere environment at sea and the printer validates and executes correctly for exactly the authorized quantity, not one part more. For defense specifically, this matters on multiple levels. ITAR controls apply to classified design files for components used in weapons, systems and aircrafts. The DOD distributed AM programs and the Navy's fleet readiness initiative specifically, which are covered in the DOD SBIR 2026.2, the Navy topic focused on additive manufacturing for fleet readiness. All requires the hardware level traceability record. A contract and a purchase order do not constitute a technical audit trial for a regulator. The hardware enforced authorization does. Among our 25 identified aerospace and defense prime contracted targets with 63 verified decision maker contracts at companies, including Lockheed Martin, Northrop Gruman, RTX, General Dynamics, BAE systems, Honeywell and GK and aerospace. The need is consistent and validated. You've mentioned in our exchanges prior to the interview, the hardware required to implement this. Already exists the ARM Trustzone and is used by many modern printer manufacturers. the hard value there, why hasn't this challenge been addressed yet, do you think? That's an excellent question. Our trust zone is built into the control boats used by many major printer manufacturers today. It creates a hardware isolated secure environment, completely separate from printers' main operating system. It is the same technology that protects mobile payments on your phone and DRM on streaming devices. The capability has existed for years. It simply has never been applied to print authorization and additive manufacturing. The reason is a market incentive gap, not a technical one. Printer manufacturers compete on build volume, material compatibility, speed and price. Enterprise security features have not historically been differentiated because procurement teams at OEMs have accepted contracts and trust as sufficient. Nobody has demanded it as a hard technical requirement in supplier qualification criteria. That is the changing for two reasons. The first regulatory environment, FAA, Arvotinus documentation, FDA, 21FCR, Part 820, Manufacturing Controls, DVDs, Supply Change, Recibility, Requirements and ITAR Compliance for classified design files. All of these frameworks are moving towards requiring a technical record at the execution layer, not just a contractual one. When the audit question sits from, do you have a contract? Two, can you prove technically that exactly 200 parts, not 201, were produced? The conversation changes completely. Second, the competitive differentiation, the printer manufacturers, that ship hardware-inforced authorization as an enterprise firmware feature. First, gains access to fortunate 500 procurement decisions that are currently blocked. 32 identified 3D printer OEM targets, including statuses, 3D systems, HP ink, Markforge, FOM labs, EOS, Bamboo labs and Velo 3D are the direct license targets for this technology. The one that most first sits the enterprise standard. So you've developed the technology, ingranted the patent, set up the company. Where are you now on the commercialisation journey? And you've touched on it a little bit there. What's the business model and how does secure print 3D fit into the existing game landscape? We are at the market development and the licensing partnership stage. The patent is granted. Discovery research is complete. The contract database is built 812 qualified prospects across four verticals. The next step is licensing the technology to printer manufacturers and enterprise AM platform providers, who embed the authorization layer into their firmware and workflows. The business model is pure patent licensing, not hardware, not services. The architecture is most valuable as a firmware feature inside existing printers, which is why the primary targets are the manufacturers themselves. The entire licensing structures, pans 3 brands, the entire one fortunate 500 companies, 15 to 25 targets, including Boeing Lockheed Martin, GE Aerospace, RTX, GM and Ford, carry upfront fee and a percentage of royalty rate and a minimum annual revenue of 8 to 25 million dollars. The entire two mid-sized manufacturers, 35 to 50 companies, including Triumph Group, Moog, Mark Forge and Jabble, carry some upfront fee and a royalty fee, the third, entire three small manufacturers, where we have 282 identified contracts through any ICS, carry a flat fee at approximately like 8% of royalty. All agreements are ten year initial terms with worldwide territory. The model is opt-in. The hobbyist and prototyping market is completely unaffected. This is an enterprise style feature for certified production AM. In the landscape, we sit upstream of workflows and the AMEAs platforms, authentic, league 3D, materialized stream mix, because we control the execution environment, not just job management. We are complimentary to traceable solutions like trace AM. The document, what was printed, we control what is authorized to print. Together, those two layers close the loop. Your offering could be of interest to many and insected like Aerospace and the fans like we've already mentioned and you've talked there about the I guess the the perspective clientele. How much had we ever made so far with those manufacturers and with the regulatory bodies in those sectors? We are in the active market development. The discovery research validated the problem at the practitioner level. The contact database spans 812 qualified prospects. 63 in Aerospace and Defence. 435 in Automative and 282 in Industrial Missionary and 32 direct OEM license targets structured outreach at programs and procurement level is underway. How the regulatory site, the frameworks are already pointing directly at the gap we fill. The FEAs, additive manufacturing guidance, identity files, traceability and process controls as requirements. The industry has not fully met technically. DVOT is distributed AM initiatives evidenced by Navy SBIR 2026.2 topic. On 26 BZ01 explicitly covering A1, digital twin and additive manufacturing for fleet readiness with Phase 1 funding for approximately $240,000. Confirm that defense procurement is actively seeking exactly the capability secure print 3D provides. A preceded SBIR grant was awarded matching our technology description precisely printer controls to limit the printing authorized amounts and IT protection when distributing two external 3D print suppliers. This is our use case government funded. So FDA 21 FCR part 820 requires manufacturing controls and traceability for medical devices. Every surgical tool custom implant and patient specific device printed at a distributed site needs a documented production record. Hardware enforced authorization provides that record technically not just contractually. For DHS CISA or technology maps directly to cyber security controls for critical infrastructure manufacturing. I want to be direct about where we are. We are building the commercial pipeline. This is the right moment. The problem is validated and the regulatory environment is moving in our direction. We are not yet signed licensing agreement with the conversation with the right people in the right sectors or underway and the one quantified market of 7.2 billion NPPV and 225 priority companies and 812 contacts is identified and mapped. Finally Ranjith and thank you for taking the time today. You've outlined there where you are today as a company in the early stages of entering the market and reaching out to those manufacturers who you think could find this solution useful. What is your vision for the company in the mid to long term and I guess what would success look like for you and for secure print 3D within the next five years? Success in five years is hardware enforced print authorization becoming the expected standard for production grade 3D printing. The way DRM is expected in steaming. The way activation control is expected in enterprise software not in niche feature for the most security conscious oeums but a baseline expectation for any facility running certified AM production. Specifically at least one major printer manufacturer shipping. This has an enterprise firmware feature and aerospace and defense procurement teams requiring hardware enforced authorization in supplier qualification criteria once that happens it cascades every time two suppliers that want to be on an approved vendor list needs to run it. The market shifts from opt-in to expected. In financial terms, success looks like the licensing program, reaching the tier one and try to penetration points in the model, 3.25 billion in cumulative five-year revenue, and 7.24 billion in 10-year NPV, 35-50 active license across tier one and entire two brands. And international patent filing active in the EU, Japan, South Korea, and China, which is on our roadmap for the next 18 months. The broader vision is unlocking distributed additive manufacturing at scale. The parts that today cannot leave the building because there is no technical control. Those parts can move. Digital spare parts programs that are commercially attractive, but IP risky. These programs can launch the supply chain that would benefit from distributed AM economics, but cannot accept the IP exposure. Those supply chains can be re-structured. That is the 76.2 billion market by 2030. We are building the infrastructure layer that makes it accessible. [Music]