Meg Whitman, the CEO of HP, told shareholders at its annual meeting in Palo Alto, Calif., that Hewlett-Packard was going to basically revolutionize the 3D printing space.
HP’s chief executive told shareholders that the company is working on solving some of the major issue with 3D printing in the marketplace.
According to Whitman, there are two main problems with 3D printing today:
- 3D printing is too slow; and
- The quality of the output is not good.
Whitman said that speed of the today’s 3D printers was “like watching ice melt.”
The company currently offers the Designjet 3D printer that uses recyclable ABS plastic. But HP is not one of the leading vendors of 3D printing technology. Stratasys Ltd. of Edina, Minn. and 3D Systems Corp. of Rock Hill, S.C., are considered the front runners in the 3D printing space.
The former CEO of Ebay.com stopped short of announcing new 3D printer products but did indicate that there might be a role within the channel ecosystem. She said that customers interested in 3D printing might use a 3D print service provider instead of obtaining a system on their own.
3D printing was an area of focus for HP in the company’s new style of IT initiative.
According to Whitman, HP’s new style of IT strategy tries to address the pace of change in IT. Whitman added that the marketplace is at an inflection point and it’s driven by trends such as cloud, security, big data and mobility. But there is a new wrinkle and it has nothing to do with technology. Customers are asking for technology to be delivered and paid for differently than before. The channel now has to be on the forefront on these new consumption models.
“That’s the new style of IT. In reality its new style of business that is driving IT. This happens every 15 years or so like Web to Web services and mobile. I saw that while I was at Ebay,” Whitman said.