Towards P2P Ecosystems of Small Manufacturers
Introductory Citation
Scale up from one: Regular people and small manufacturing companies that lack investment capital will be able to set up low investment, “start small and scale up as it goes” businesses. Thanks to the low-cost Internet virtual storefronts, and the low cost of small-scale manufacturing for prototypes and custom goods, new companies can get started on a shoestring budget, yet sell their wares or services to niche, global marketplaces.
- Hod Lipson & Melba Kurman [1]
Discussion
Hod Lipson & Melba Kurman:
"Personal manufacturing technologies are the ideal foundation for an emerging ecosystem of small manufacturers that sell custom-made machine parts to the government or other clients via online procurement catalogs. The long tail of machine parts is already taking shape in all places, an online supplies catalog managed by the Department of Defense (DoD).
...
the Department of Defense developed Emall, an online repository of approved vendors that sell batteries, aircraft covers, office supplies and packing material to government agencies. Over the years, DoD’s Emall has grown from a research and development project to a billion-dollar government enterprise. Today, Emall’s product catalog includes over 70 million items from 1,900 individual suppliers.
Imagine a future online long tail government marketplace, similar to Emall combined with 100Kgarages.com, where government procurement officers and other customers would not just procure supplies, but browse electronic blueprints in search of a desired custom part or object.
...
a long tail manufacturing marketplace taking place in the commercial sector is exemplified by a company called eMachineShop which provides easy, convenient and low-cost fabrication services of custom parts via its web site. eMachineShop has its own, proprietary design software that customers use to design the part they need so they can submit the blueprint design to eMachineShop for an instant price quote. Once their design is completed, customers can play with alternative options that affect the cost of manufacturing their desired design by getting a smorgasbord of cost estimates based on using different available materials, and adding or subtracting product features." (http://web.mae.cornell.edu/lipson/FactoryAtHome.pdf)