>> no one litigates. i'm happy again. >> i want to talk about two topics. you talked about energy-efficient and renewables. integrating and finding ways to make these apples to apples is always a tricky. epa is working pretty hard to put together and support the kind of model rules, model guided. they give states the opportunity to opt into some kind of baseline. is that a fair assumption? >> at the fair assumption that folks have asked us to look at a variety of tools that epa is familiar with traffic on those in regional affairs and we're looking at those flexibilities and we see great opportunity to

provide stable platform for those discussions. >> the pride that many things stood in their way, did anybody else is how much after is there to opt-in to embrace the kind for template? how much enthusiasm and there'd be in the rps? everyone has their own little wiggle and circumstances. had he imagine that that playing out? with a uniform, tradable, flexible framework or retrain to reckon i'll? >> i too am sick. i hope that iraq will be a little too infirm that price is whether were able to find a happy medium place, the truth is we are a very diverse group of states. you just made a statement that everyone liked and rps now some

of my colleagues may not so much and some of my colleagues might see a few other name about being optimistic. our were is aimed at not only educating our mom errs, with a consensus. they bring together states like colorado, maine, west kentucky, virginia. it's incredible to me that we were able to come up with upon which we would all agree enough for that to the epa in a concert of informative way. i'm hopeful that we can with regard to proposing solutions for what the standards might need. we have folks who are very learned in this area is, very expressed colleagues who are

very committed to a number of research institutes and others. i won't name one because then i have to name them all who are committed to working in this area and a part in the work state and offering solutions as well. that will be a very difficult after that i think we are all committed to. i really am hope all that we can offer standards and solutions where we've reached some level of consent is in a way that is helpful to the epa as well. >> a little bit on energy efficiency. what kinds of activities are underway in europe most optimistic about? t. think there are things that the epa canoes to accelerate? how they can affect the compliant look of your energy-efficient the? >> it will be a tremendous aspect. certainly the work happening in vermont is a great example.

the oregon energy trust to rate the arkansas banner in the south and south east. our energy efficiency program have really informed and influenced work in surrounding states. this were quite frankly as they went win-win. it is a win for consumers clearly, the lowest-cost form of energy. it is a win for industry. they are having to spend less on this and these power plants commercially to put these questions later potentially for those committing types of pollutants. and finally, it is a win for the irony. we really, i think, should hold up our efficiency program as the best we have to offer alongside a renewable work. but our work in energy-efficient the is something to which many

states have been very committed. i have to also give credit to industry. they've really put her all into executing robust, proven programs are great results. so i'm hopeful that these eat programs and they are different across the country, but that they offer the best resource we have to offer. >> i also want to recognize the dark is doing great work. the president at the environmental council of state is running the entire department chair. the collaboration between the energy and environmental world is essential for us to tackle these issues.

so it's -- i think it's a testament this world is changing. more important to test it to the has exhibited and we think and know we can call upon her to engage on these important issues. it makes all the difference in

the work going forward as were committed to being optimistic about the future and committed to working on the difficult tasks that lay ahead. >> you're in a close proximity to people of similar obligations and he almost never talk to each other. you actually smiled when he said it. it is unusual since the interagency process of often not with such affection. i wonder if he'll talk a little bit about energy at the unreliability, del, ferc, how are you grappling. i think we understood because of the rule is so intimately tied to the energy world that we need to be closely aligned with d.o.e. and ferc.

we ignore the and rage so we have done i think a really good job at trying to work with d.o.e. and pick their brains and make sure what we are designing that they would agree with our projections, our analysis and our way of framing issues in the opportunities and the same with the. jason, i feel we are presenting a bit of a rosy picture. everyone knows i am a stock realized. i know the challenge we are having, but we couldn't be better positioned at this point for something that keeps the conversation going. one of the reasons we are doing so much outrage is just a recognition that this is an issue. the only thing i hope when this proposal goes out as people will will look at it and say epa

lists and. epa did what they were supposed to do. they challenged the full range of ideas. they put up lots of questions and they are willing and the comment process to get to a final that might be different from the proposal because it is informed by further discussion. i think many times we get criticized because there's so much change between proposal and final. that's when i dance in the streets because i think that is exactly what it is supposed to be. because you put concrete ideas on instead of lofty discussions and you start digging into what really matters to people as all the details. and so i am pretty excited to get this out of interagency, to get folks looking at this and to know that we listened and there's lots more room for it. >> i love the idea when federal officials and change is actually a sign of courage and weakness.

boras and especially -- >> it's called democracy. >> it sure is. >> i guess i'll ask each of you to share some final osgood with the idea you want to leave this intent crowd with? >> thank you, jason. today is an example of what gina just mention. we are very committed to this work. we live and breathe it and therefore it is important for us as economic regulators to not only be in the room, but to engage in a significant and meaningful way to help resolve these issues. to do that, we certainly engaged tremendously with gina and her team and i agree with her. i am an optimist, but i am realistic about the challenges that lie ahead. i'm realistic about the fact that some of my colleagues will

continue to have concerns about reliability as we continue this work. it means we have to double down into an even better job of thinking about every possibility, about every strategy and i'm very confident in the work of my colleagues and also those in industries that are on the front lines doing this work. last but not least, i'm very confident about our engagement with gina and her team going forward. >> just final word is always deep tank collapsed in naruc and the energy world for the work they are doing on this, but also thank you, jason. we've been working for a long time in the same arena. you've always been incredibly helpful, but i think we both share an interest in making sure that environmental issues aren't seen as partisan issues. you're here at the bipartisan

policy center for a reason because you believe a strong -- i think the most important thing i want to know whether you're an environmental, energy world is that the most important thing is that we all try to find ways of serving the people that we are serving most. and that means giving man some real opportunities to address climate change, which is a threat to the public health and environment, but also we find the most cost-effective ways to align that with a really robust 21st energy system that can support that. if we keep that in mind and try to get involved and find ways to find a path forward that can get to those goals, i think what you

just fine. >> let me thank both of our panelists. we could not be in better hands in this tremendous beginning with what is the good, engaging detail. a round of applause. [applause] administrator mccarthy. [applause] a few words where we go from here. as you know, this is the last of our scheduled forms. we have a lot of meaning, bipartisan policy center and there's a number of suggestions over the course of the last several of the issues that prove basic. maybe a somewhat mauler wing we have really been delighted at partnership and we look forward to working with any of you if there's other issues whether public or private forums. we are also thinking about

having when the rulemaking comes out to an open reading or something that allows us to differ. the bipartisan policy center as you know are always working on economic modeling and different imaginations and scenarios presenting more work publicly in may. not even tell anybody what the answer is, but to challenge anybody to come up a better idea and we need to have a dynamic and public commerce nation. so, we are going to be taking question on those notecards. i will also note that those of you in the atmosphere can tweet questions. hash tag bipartisan nine bp center/bipartisan. it is now my pleasure to bring

up the next panel. great pleasure to introduce the modern panel, senator byron dorgan. iran has been a dear friend and later at work with the bbc center and resulted in many opportunities to introduce senator dorgan. it's fresh. i dug a little deeper this time. the ones that are wikipedia. it turns out senator dorgan was the youngest constitutional officer ever elect it in the of north dakota. he began his career deeply engaged in state issues at the north dakota state commissioner. so when you understand the optimism, the jovial spirit that senator dorgan calls in the reserve, you understand it started out as commissioner for more than a couple years in north dakota. you can always count on byron

dorgon for at least one gerson keillor quote. i now convened a panel on a number of our leading commissioners and look forward to a very engaging day. thank you. [applause] [inaudible conversations]

there's an old saying that the jury has 100 fathers and defeat is an arcane. i wouldn't be surprised if the information in regard to other recent activities. >> we are just talking about the fact that the interrogation last week at the committee senator goldwater asking questions about the use of the carrier aircraft from s.b. carrier aircraft after we figure that somebody over there has told them about that thing on wednesday morning and will spring up where goldwater is going to going to spring it in such a way that it looks like there's u.s. air cover and you are wrong and i was wrong in saying there wasn't.

>> next coming house here in looking at 3-d printing technology and how it's creating opportunities for entrepreneurs and small business owners. the house small business committee heard testimony for manufacturers and consumers about the trade-offs of said technology, including its potential for making firearms. the hearing for march is an hour and 10 minutes. >> i will go ahead and call the hearing to order. the ranking member will be delayed for just a little bit. we also have a vote coming up at any moment, which will delay the hearings lately, which i apologize for that. we never know for sure when they scheduled vote and unfortunately the schedule right middle of her hearing. we will go ahead and get started and see how far we can get before they do call that vote. 3-d printing is a process of

creating objects from a digital model. particularly layer upon layer until an object is sworn in today we are here to how 3-d print team is pretty much premiership all across the country. the technology has been around since the 1980s and has traditionally been used by large companies for rapid prototyping. the last 10 years from a 3-d printers have become more affordable, opening door for smaller businesses notch printer is to begin benefiting from the technology. some models are now available for under $1500 analysts expect us to continue to go down. small businesses notch winner is use 3-d printing in a variety of ways has the ability to save time and cost in prototypes make a hacker part that persistent product production to produce finished projects that may be sold directly to end-users. 3-d printing has become and will be a critical component of the operations of many small

businesses. a number of entrepreneurs and at-home innovators are using it for models of products they intend to manufacture traditional methods, others use technology to create projects from start to finish. sometimes that can be done right there in the garage. as 3-d printers continue to become more affordable and advanced, the number of small business that began as tousled manufacturers is to skyrocket. while some embracing capitalize on new technologies, others are very weary and cautious about the technology. as congress and other regulatory bodies consider policies applicable to this another technological advance is, it's important that we must not be hasty and do not unduly restrict the ability of small businesses, entrepreneurs and other innovators to grow our economy. we're fortunate to have at this group an interesting group of users of the technology which

include entrepreneurs to do 3-d printing development of product. i look forward to hearing from your inside the house mall businesses are using this technology to grow anonymously create jobs, which is what this committee is all about. so we'll move right on into her witnesses. for witness today is patrick o'neal, founder and ceo -- although clip? clip on lens for high phones and other apple products. he was product manager and vp a premier systems, which is in information technology reseller and consulting organization. mr. o'neill was named ostrander magazine 2013 entre partner of the year. look forward to hearing her testimony. >> chairman graves, ranking member vazquez and members of the committee, i am patrick o'neill, ceo and founder of mobile clip company. i invented the clip on lens for the iphone.

i am very grateful for the opportunity to speak with you regarding our use of 3-d printing and how it helped the small business go from the kitchen started three years ago to something in every apple store worldwide. i spent my whole career in the technology industry. over 30 patents and 3-d printing has enabled us to innovate. this space has required us to be the forefront of mobile technology as well as jobs in america. in creating olloclip, i wanted a photo length to give people the ability to use python to capture videos artistically and creatively. olloclip was designed by steve jobs, founder of will -- apple. since the start, we employ the simple design philosophy. it began when the design studios in my kitchen with a local 3-d printing company to produce hundreds of prototypes. i would ask myself, would steve jobs think this product is good

enough? beas would invariably be no peer deeper finding until we felt the result would meet standards. after your development we lodged olloclip through the platform in may 2011. study received funding within four weeks and achieved almost five times are outstanding goal. since there started three years ago, was moved three times to larger offices and now employ more than 50 people including seven full-time designers. today said it is considered illegal in mobile start. but it products are now sold more than 90 countries. olloclip has attracted a legion of users and numerous awards. i was also fortunate enough to be named entrepreneur of the year by entrepreneur. 3-d printing enabled me to innovate quickly and turn i.t. into a commercial product. design and 3-d printing of the corporate development. in the past six months we created six new projects to enhance their line of photography tool thanks in part

to 3-d printing. we've invested more than $50,000 3-d printing to prototyper on projects via welles will have rumored device is. the lens can be designed quickly. we sketch an idea in the morning, modeled the afternoon at an a to the 3-d printer and of a prototype that evening. the faster and keeps the companies in space. we finished and validated in iphone five. i can imagine doing this without her of 3-d printer. here's the process developing products. we started brainstorming a concert generation and sketch ideas and create novels for those ideas on the computer and printer models on the 3-d printer. thanks to evaluate the prototyper functionality, proportions and aesthetics. changes are made as needed and reprinted. if the prototype is approved, we look forward to mass production. the mobile device market changes

so quickly. to stay competitive we develop new ideas. we found the best way to innovate quickly get to market faster. we now develop products in a week or two without 3-d printing that can take months for development. as apple launches products would miss critical launch timing and this could result in a potential loss of millions of dollars in sales, perhaps failure. small size companies like ours need the ability to compete in the world stage, especially rapidly changing industries by consumer technology. as 3-d printing above, we like the bridge manufacturing of finished projects to market faster. at olloclip, we continue to think differently and are not afraid to try new things. we only build products that can innovate. 3-d printing office to take more risks because it shrinks the opportunity costs. wrote to test and validate within a day or two rather than a month or two. after unsuccessfully can quickly move on to try something else. our success has come from our passion and perseverance, ability to take risks and blaze

new trails but it comes to product innovation. as congress and others consider printing, it will be important to insurance reverse psych myself were able to continue using technology in innovative ways. i'm honored to be here today. many thanks to chairman graves, ranking member velasquez in this committee. >> or next witnesses the executive vice president of public affairs on global leading manufacturer of 3-d printers. he has served in several positions including executive vice president of global government relations and marketing of service company spokesperson. he is also the position of general manager for the 3-d printing business. today is testifying on behalf of the national association manufacturers. welcome to the committee. >> thank you. chairman graves, ranking member velasquez and 20 members come and thank you for the opportunity to tell you about 3-d printing in our company is

hoping mall businesses grow and thrive in this economy. i name is jonathan cobb and an executive vice president for stratus is based in eden prairie, minnesota. we are a member of the national says the addition of any factor is and i'm honored to testify on behalf of the organist nation. as the nation's largest manufacturing trade association that now represents 12,000 multi-large manufacturers in every industrial air in every state. manufacturers are the world leading innovators and perform two thirds of all your r&d in the nation, producing more innovative breakthroughs than any other sector. i'm proud to say that 3-d printing are part of this innovative american in this area. you may be asking what is 3-d printing and why should i care about it?

simply put, 3-d printing is the process of turning digital blueprints into tangible objects within a matter of hours. it works by sending digital schematics to the printer, which then shaved thin layers of plastic, metal or other materials into physical objects are ever at couple samples i'm hoping we can talk about a little bit later on some questions. although the concept may be news to many of you here today, this technology has existed for decades. 3-d printers originally created to help engineers test designs before spending money at expensive factory tooling for production. today 3-d printers are not only just used to make prototypes, they're also used for low volume manufacturing items such as pacific clams and interior components of your cross. 3-d printing salsa founded in a classroom. in fact, since 2002, nearly one quarter of business has been in education. ..

a hobbit was yet to be seen. i started working in march 2005 at within the last incubator philips electronics. at the time printing issues was for large companies and is very expensive. buy cheap hazmat anyone they can get products they want. we started in 19 products, not prototypes. 2010 as an independent company and moved to new york city. new york is providing us with

high caliber times are innovative solutions. it's also the creative epicenter shootout so many customers who learned firsthand. today we have over 100 employees in new york, seidel. these factories are transforming into factors of the future at the defendant processes and machinery. it is not for the marketplace to make, buy and sell custom products and design opportunities for partners and creative consumers. shape is a success story, better opportunities traded for entrepreneurs are immeasurable. when i think about what we can achieve i relate to engineers to become much for nurse. before the internet became mainstream, bringing a software to market was extremely difficult. you have to know what users wanted and produce floppy disk, bring it to retail at how people

would buy it. today, using the internet from any suffrage or can become a much better. the internet has repairs. watching a website is incredibly easy and this is one of the reasons i come is that google, amazon or face that became successful so quickly. similar to barriers for software development, 3-d printing removes barriers. they can have a product printed photo cost's others donate marketing research in advance. the products and payments for manufacture what i'm products directly on time. plus, they can continue products are set up to keep an inventory. there is no question not printers are taking notice. from 2012 to 2013, product increase from 40,000 per month to 100,000 per month and a member of the people grading projects has doubled. 3-d printing enables the entrepreneur in ways we could never conceive of in the past.

to understand detail, let me quickly share to 10 works. very many for free and open software programs available to you so literally anyone can do it. after its athletic come of the user selects and it showed the prefix is available. shapeaways including precious metal, ceramic undecideds are reviewed by engineers and uploaded to printers and then there premade after which they are claimed by the engineers and put in books and sent to anyone. the printing described above is at the core of shapeaways. model trains, jewelry such as lamps, dishware, cups, plates come et cetera. about a few samples to see over here. and they share one example that was a successful business at

shapeaways. four friends were working in creative industries in new york city wanted to create some more tangible lasting starting with the cufflinks and eventually moving into other jewelry. three applications to develop the ability to quickly turn fiscal prototypes and then products have failed. the metal casting machinery so there projects and through other channels in their business with exist without shapeaways printing. the ability to create customizable projects is an otherwise extremely cost intensive process, printing makes this a must. one is the nervous systems. design a process creating simulations from national phenomenon. the process generates product searches truly jewelry and light fixtures. although these products are one-of-a-kind by shapeaways in multiple retail channels

including new york. another example of a successful business employed more people every day. i want to conclude with the fact that even the president of the united states has acknowledged a great opportunity shapeaways is working on what the white house for the first effort dedicated to showcasing and celebrating the maker movement. the goal is to support the call to action for stakeholders in shapeaways is committed to moments in time to facilitate entrepreneurship in the state of the last month president obama spoke about the facility same it is the now state-of-the-art lab for printing and has the potential to revolutionize almost everything. 3-d printing does have potential to revolutionize the way remake everything. i'm passionate and i hope i have effectively demonstrated to you the positive impacts i can have on small business creating many jobs in the process.

moving forward this accessibility for 3-d printing. thank you for time today. the technology i'm sure will change the world. >> thank you, peter. our next witness to say is jan baum, charged with bringing a 3-d printing of rapid technology to the greater baltimore region. also a full professor at thompson university and founder at the university's object plan, comprehensive state-of-the-art rapid technologies and digital fabrication. in 2012 ms. bomb had been manufacturing region in 2013 was named innovator of the year by maryland daily record. thanks for being here. >> chairman graves, ranking member the last class to speak with you about technology significantly impact and how we carry out our work across

industries. .. and wanting to prototype and how he sent $2500 to china and heard and it hadn't heard anything. i said well send me the 2-d drawings and we will see what we can do. he had the 3-d files made in two days later hopeful he knocked on my door to show me the progress

not expecting what he found. i pointed to the bill platform of the 3-d printer and he looked at his prototype sitting on the bill platform and looked at me looked at the printer and looked at me speechless. i said that your prototype. he looked to the printer and looked back at me and he said this is like magic. it's not magic but it's a tool that helps us to her work better more efficiently locally and many times most times faster with optimize solutions across industries whatever work it is we are carrying out. 3-d printing and manufacturing is a 21st century technology changing the who, how went wide and importantly the wide of what we make in how we solve problems. if we can imagine it and we have the skill to design at the 3-d printers will print it. we are making we could've never made before and there are tons of examples in the table here today. it's disrupting economies of scale, current business models and democratizing promotion

across industries. innovation and entrepreneurial opportunities are at the heart of this technology. there are some barriers to engagement access to knowledge and knowledge sources and understanding what that technology can and can't do overcoming industrial thinking is a huge one. we have made things attractively for a long time and we are very good at it. cost of entry. allocation of resources whether capital human is a challenge for small businesses and entrepreneurs and then the position of the technology. are we there yet is a question we receive regularly. the leadership of howard county in maryland county executive ken hohman the howard county economic development authority ceo larry tullio and the executive director of the maryland center for entrepreneurship are very strong leadership team for howard county and they very easily saw the vision and the opportunity that these technologies brought and supported small business in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. 3-d maryland is an

entrepreneurial initiative addressing barriers to entry and business advantages of three deep printing for our target audiences. we are a racing awareness of implementation. 3-d maryland is identifying and addressing opportunities to strengthen and advance the rapid tech ecosystem in maryland and we are building a loosely coupled system of collaborative relationships and partnerships across sectors to in debate and accelerate the region in and the country's economic competitiveness. i respectfully recommend this committee encourage and support an initiative such as 3-d maryland to have a focus on multisector russ disciplinary three competitive collaboration telling on the strength and core competencies to advance current practices foster innovation and grow regional ecosystems while taking advantage of public funding sources. supporting initiatives like 3-d maryland builds on the momentum created by recent initiative such as the national manufacturing additive

innovation institute. addressing and creating an adaptive workforce at all points in the spectrum is critical to our engagement of these technologies. i would recommend working at the grassroots level locally with users with proven track records from both industry and education so we can institute changes in k. through 16 vocational training and apprenticeship programs retraining programs etc.. wider adoption is an advil. we need to ensure the workforce is prepared to increase engagement. studies have shown that students were educated and added manufacturing processes among the first to bring advanced hands-on technologies to their employers and that's something i've told my students that tauscher university you are workforce leaders. continuing to support research money and programs that facilitate technology transfer 3-d printing and attitude manufacturing are just getting started. i thank you very much for your attention or consideration of with these technologies. >> thank you very much and we will recess until after the

series of votes. then we will come back and start with questions. the committee is in recess. >> thank you mr. chairman and i called the panelists for a very impressive testimony. it's interesting stuff. on the way over to vote a while ago i was talking to mr. bentivolio who has experience in your field and it's fascinating to talk about the possibilities and as a small business guy it's very rewarding to see the entrepreneurial aspect of this and see folks doing some really good stuff. one of the concerns i have is getting startups like what you do and the revenue product in and the process from the standpoint of not widely used i guess. or the regulatory problems we need to be aware of in congress that we need to put a stop to or are there ways we can enhance your ability to do your job better legs just go down the

line and whoever has comments or concerns. everybody has concerns about washington these days, trust me and rightly so. mr. o'neill d. want to start? do you have any problems with us? >> i do not have any problems with you. >> not yet, right? obviously the health care law something that concerns us so that may be a concern to you but from the standpoint of producing your product that's the regulation stuff. >> i. >> i figured we keep working hard and designing great products and making money everything else will fix itself. >> you or so far ahead of regulations that you have outrun us. >> i don't want that to happen. our feet have not hit the ground we shipped our first order to apple out of our house less than three years ago and you know now we keep moving. we have 1,700,000 square-foot facility now and that's not enough. we need to get a bigger one.

i understand there are some complications and i let other people in our business worry about that. that is why don't seem concerned and i'm sure i should be. >> there are a lot of people to worry for you. mr. cobb. >> thanks. going back to the beginning which is where i started in 88. we have shipped 50% of our business overseas so we continue to do that at this point in time. it's been a big piece of our business. if you look at areas that we are concerned about or could be concerned about it would be any export laws that would restrict this technology from moving out from the u.s.. if you look at the bulk of our business we manufacture in new hampshire. we manufacture in new york and we manufacture in minnesota and so all these products are being

exported. anything that would harm that export. >> there is no problem in that area. it's not a barrier yet. >> it's not a barrier yet but i don't know if there has been discussion about that. >> we can be watchful for that and that's the purpose of the hearing today that we know those things ahead of time. mr. weijmarshausen. >> we are not really concerned about things are currently in place but there might be something that you could help with or think of. we have a large community of designers that make your own ideas come to life using our platform very they are uploaded to our sites and we have it printed and we ship it back to them. the other element is we enable people to open shows when we can can -- if some of these products currently infringe copyrights which very rarely but it does happen the dmc eight gives a

very nice process where the copyright holder can send us a notice. we take down the product from our web site and the story or the discussion than is between the copyright holder and the person that is the idea. you have to realize we have 400,000 community members and it's growing very quick way. we get 100,000 new designs every month so these numbers are really large. the dmc helps with the inspector however there is no such process for batteries so if somewhat would infringe there is no clear process akin to the dmc a that would enable the patent holder to notify us and then the discussion becomes between the copyright patent and the copyright holder. in that case we are party to the discussion which of course is really hard for us because we get so many new designs that is

completely impossible for us to check also given the fact in most cases we print things only once and it's completely impossible to check whether there are patent infringements going on at the time. of course we are open to compelling technology to help solve this but since it works so well for copyrights i would suggest maybe think about having a similar type process for platforms and there are others coming up as well in the united states and abroad to have such a process that can help these platforms stay scalable and flexible. >> you have disclosure statements that you have to sign when you are sent a drawing of some kind by an individual or company that says if you produce this object that you are restricted from showing it to anybody else or anything like that? >> the idea of shapeaways is its community and openness. we ask people to you own the copyright and the rights to use

this product? to have the right to have it manufactured for yourself and do you have the rights if have the right to v-12 to sell it to others? people have to state that they have those rights of ports however some people might not read that. >> very good. my time is up area and thank you. >> mr. bentivolio. >> thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you for coming in. >> we had an interesting discussion about the possibilities of 3-d printing and i explained to my colleagues that i was a vocational education teacher as well as general ed and was in the automotive design business for almost 20 years and i'm very familiar with 3-d printing and proud to say that many of my female students studied biomechanical engineering because of some of the things they got to make in my classroom using a 3-d printer from the state university.

at the time we sent the design to them and they printed it for $35 send it back in a nice package instead of putting something on the refrigerator door, hey mom look what i did in class they got to put it on the table which is kind of interesting. in that regard i'm wondering the possibilities, we are we are looking at things like for instance one of my questions is if i could scan something, can i digitize that and have it made? for instance hip replacements and that kind of thing, could i use an x-ray data and converted to digital and then have it custom-made hip for a patient if i was a doctor? and there are some regulatioregulatio ns that would have to come with that too, right? there has to be sterile material so we could do that with bone as well? if someone crusted bone we could

replace that using a 3-d printer and how long would that take for instance? i and not a doctor so i couldn't even name a bone in my risk. >> both of those examples are in current practice today. to my understanding most of that work is being done abroad in germany and sweden. one of the oems and sweden is producing hip replacements and while he can take the personalized data from the ct scanner and mri scan and digitize that we can build that into a three-dimensional model my understanding is right now what we are doing is creating those hip replacements and small medium and large three or four sizes because that is the java must effectively. there are and i may not remember the name of the university that is doing the bone implanting. i think it's in texas that are growing bone structures for biomedical engineering is huge. what i would say and share with you as johns hopkins university's there's a skull surgeon there and he uses 3-d printing to create 3-d prints to

do preop planning. so before the team ever goes into the operating room exactly what the cuts are what is removed where the samples are and everything is done in order to simplify that process. i think that's fantastic. the doctor is working less hours in a stressful situation the patient is under anesthesia less time and operate and cost are a huge contributor to health care costs and that is lower. this is disruptive technology. that is going to upset the apple cart in many directions so the business model for hospitals is now going to be disrupted. they may not be so happy about operating room costs operating room times been declined because now they have to rework the numbers again but health care, medical is one of the first enter shays to engage in it. >> so we can actually for instance if there were someone who needed plastic surgery a plastic surgeon could use the

x-rays and nowhere the cuts are going to be and know how they are going to repair the patient's face? >> absolutely and they are using particular surgical guide so they put the 3-d print right on the patient's body and they know the tool and they know the cut in the angle. it takes a lot of the guesswork out and i would also volunteer that in terms of what 3-d maryland does one of our first activities was to create an expert user group so together all the expert users in maryland around these tech elegies and cross pollinate them so the lab is collaborating with him to build robotics to make that surgery even better, to make it even smoother. we are also printing sells and i'm not sure i know the doctor is doing this but they are printing skin during surgery from the patient itself. when you print cells from the patient you really limit the

risk of rejection or the body rejecting whatever you are putting in or on it. >> so now we have that and it also reduces 3-d printing build time, correct? no longer are we doing giant clay models. we can design parts for instance for a motorcycle. i could design everything on that motorcycle using a 3-d printer put it together and make sure it all fits and probably reduce my build time prototype cost. do you have any numbers? >> john can probably speak to this even more clearly but when i see the cases roll through and i say what am i going to present for a baseline, many times it's a third or fifth of the cost savings in a time savings. the other thing too is if you have the savings when you put those together and they are not quite right you are not going back to square one. you are tweaking. >> how long would it take for me for instance once i have that information digitized and i'm

going to do the surgery to have maybe a model that i can practice or look at? how long would that take to have that prototype or 3-d print? >> really those are hard questions because you don't know how much data and what the scale is in scale as a factor. i would say looking at his goals he uses soa technology. i think the schools probably take three or four hours. maybe six hours and what i am advocating for maryland and i think it's a model that we could all look at is that maryland create a consortium base model where we have state-of-the-art medical facility so he can see a patient from shock trauma and its zip files to a local center and get them. we don't have to worry about fedex anymore and then we will

start to see improvements in the technology as well. >> i started in the business mr. chairman willie took a -- on a car and waited for months to get a prototype model and now we can get it done in a matter of hours. >> thank you very much and i appreciate you being here. i yield back mr. chair. >> thank you mr. chairman. i'm sorry i missed the opening part. i was caught in another hearing so thank you for coming. i may well ask questions you have already answered and i apologize. we have been using 3-d printing in five or six years and one of my companies to make small-scale models of fairly complex machinery is part of our scales proposal. it's a 6 million-dollar proposal and it's well worth delivering that and maybe others will catch up that early on we were the only one doing it. there was a wow factor there and when we got the order everyone in the customers company wanted another one.

so it is great. it's great for a lot of things and we use it as a sales tool. i guess my question comes to as this takes off are there any quality control issues on repeatability and all the things you do and other qualities you do for repeatability. are there quality control issues and want to get into production and out of prototyping, i'm not sure if somebody wants to jump in. >> so since we are building hundreds of thousands of products on a yearly basis actually over 100,000 a month for our customers we see these kinds of problems pop up. we may for instance popular iphone cases and for them to fit and to be clear shapeaways prints final products. i use my cell is 3-d printing. they need to be exact fit and

since 3-d printing was used for a long time as a prototyping technology there is definitely a need for technology to improve from a quality perspective and a price and even from a speed perspective to meet the needs of today's consumers. from a prototyping perspective uis have somewhat of an option if the prototype doesn't come out right to do it again but if you have a consumer who has a birthday party where he needs to bring a present you only have one shot to get it right and get out the door at a time. technology has come a long way and it's great we can make final products using 3-d printing but i think the technology is still in my opinion in its infancy and it will keep growing as the consumer market engages. there will be large jumps in technology. >> as you are layering of this, plastics understand that i'm sure powdered metals are probably being used in some

ceramics. is that the place and what happens when you get into the need for a high alloy stainless steels etc.? is that way out? >> we are printing metal and ceramic and the same kind you'd find in a jewelry store. we prints with stainless steel and brass and bronze and adding other precious metals in. >> carbon steel too? is that coming to believe? >> yeah. >> as this takes off a what is the thought on the cost? today you have a lot of machines running unintended labor costs. he said a machine up and they pop those out in a dark factory. is this similar? what would be the labor cost to make the part using 3-d versus automated equipment in a factory that the machine does it without manpower?

>> i think you look at where 3-d printing is being utilized today and as was mentioned before is being utilized in the manufacturing environment. aerospace company, automotive companies and many people are using 3-d printing today so i think where it makes sense is not the things we are thinking about where you are making tens of millions of bottle caps or things like that but where it make sense in this point in time is when you have a short production type run or maybe something where because of regulations or other reasons it's constantly changing so when you look at the cost of the piece per cost you will get license printing and will be more than injection molding however you are not going to have to build that tool so as is a small-business owner couple of cases mentioned here today you

are not going to have the upfront costs but also not going to have that upfront knowledge as well because you can design something and tested and prototype and start printing that as is your real part. so it's a little bit different as far as high-volume versus mid-to low volume i believe. >> thank you very much. my time has expired so i yield back. >> thank you mr. chairman and i think the panel for your testimony today. you know what the rapid growth and accessibility of 3-d printing there is room for great innovation as has been stated. as many of you testified 3-d printing provides endless opportunities for entrepreneurs however with companies like maker-bot increasingly reducing the cost owned and operated 3-d printers do you feel consumers

will become their own manufacturers making their services and many small businesses offer obsolete? 's. >> you now certainly maker-bot and products like that really enable a lot of people to do work and design work and some production work that we are talking about. i think for certain products yeah you could see where a product like maker-bot would actually be used in a home environment. i think though that where some of the big opportunities for 3-d printing comes in is really in the manufacturing process. as we talked about before it allows current manufacturers to build things in a different manner to customize things in a different way so i think there

are certainly some products that are geared toward that but if you look at the use of 3-d printing and all the different materials that are going on today i think the bigger advances are going to come in the manufacturing area. with that comes a whole area where students today were people in the workplace today are used to manufacturing and traditional methods. so training of people that are currently employed or training of students to design utilizing 3-d printing is one thing but then to manufacture the 3-d printing is vastly different but it can't be used in fact and that is one of the big inhibitors in getting 3-d printing into small and medium-sized companies is because the characteristics of 3-d printers are different than the characteristics of injection molding for instance.

>> on another note i serve on homeland security as well and the potential of creating weapons through this 3-d printing, what is the feasibility and the possibility and you know someone coming along and creating a nondetectable firearm or something? >> well, we have them staunch supporters of the plastic gun legislation which was enacted at the end of last year as a matter of fact. it's something that has been demonstrated. at some point but we have certainly been a supporter of the legislation that is taking place up to this point looking at the restrictions on that opportunity. >> okay. could someone potentially not

follow the guidelines and regulations for this type of product and create something that is not detectable and causes a problem? >> i am not an expert but i think that you need some type of medal for the firing mechanism for the firearms so again i'm not an expert on that but what i know i think it would be difficult. >> okay. thank you. >> mr. schweikart. >> thank you mr. chairman. it always make me nervous when technology like this is here in congress because it means we are paying attention to you and let's face it when that bureaucracy pays attention to a technology we often try to

regulate it or screw it up and i say this in the context of someone who believes one of the great successes of the internet was the fact that it grew and grew before the bureaucratic mechanisms truly understood it and were able to slow down the investments, the capital and the creativity. so whether it be 3-d printing or even the thing that maybe you and i haven't found yet which may be the large-scale or the high-speed production of such. what systemic threat to the industry? is a copyright? is that the source files having patent litigation or copyright litigation or is it those in government bureaucracy? if i came to you right now and set over the next decade this is one of the great disruptive

technologies that's going to make us a more efficient society but we have to conquer these risks to that expansion. for each of you in starting with mr. o'neill. >> i am an entrepreneur i'm not representing entrepreneurs in her own business so these kinds of questions don't really apply to us but i would sincerely hope that no legislation comes than. >> what about the discussion and i know we have all been running in and out so i haven't heard. copyright. >> copyright is a concern to us as a copyright holder and as a holder of over 30 patents i am concerned that people will infringe our patents and their designs and they will print them and we have had that happen. we had that happen with shapeaways and we were able to

deal with it but it's a concern. it seems like something needs to be addressed but i've not sure 3-d printing is a specific concern. we have people in china making contra fit products all the time and they are not doing it with 3-d printing. they are doing it with traditional manufacturing. >> what his fist systemic risk and i think there is a discussion saying if there's a change in the source code does that lead to copyright? >> as a manufacturer the laws in this country you have the patent protection and from a manufacturer what we do is we spend 10 to 12% of our overall revenue on trying to be more innovative and stay ahead things that are going to fallout as far as the patent goes. i think looking at, you talked

about the inhibitor, one of the things that makes this -- this may be off base here but one of the things that will not help the industry as much as possible is people, young people and traditional workers not being educated in this technology and i think it's a real opportunity at this point in time to have education, a high school level and at grade school and even workers that are displaced because of manufacturing. i think manufacturing is starting to come back into the u.s. and i think 3-d printing is a portion of that and i think there's a real opportunity for the federal government to get more involved in the training of new students and traditional workforce. >> there are also certain risk profiles that come with that. what would be a systemic risk to your business?

>> replayed the issue you mentioned, shapeaways is a platform service so what we want to do is create as many many products are people as they like and make it possible for them to create things that were not possible before. everybody can now make things instead of owning the companies that we are taking very serious the responsibility that we need to take and if we can only make things better -- and the good thing is shapeaways has made 2.5 million products to date and the amount of products that we have to take down and the amount of products that we actually made using the printers that were infringing in hindsight were extremely small, counting on one hand or two hands that we actually made. that i think is a good thing because people grasp that they can make anything they want. actually the technology is much more expensive also been

manufacturing so it's easier to copy something popular with traditional manufacturing technologies as mentioned in china perhaps then you can do with the 3a 3-d printer. >> forgive me because i'm going up against time but academia is always an interesting world where it sits there where what is in the public domain so you may have to navigate some more interesting discussion on that. >> i guess my response to the question, i am an advocate of the technology for business industry and entrepreneurs in what i hear from by expert users is one of the things that is going to hold the industry back or is holding an is holding and she baccas purpura tired -- proprietary nest of the hardware and materials. the expert users that i see using the technology in the most advanced way say to the oems i don't care about your warranty and one under the hood and they will hire a third party contractor that provides the

warranty so they can put in any material they want and they can tweet back the parameters. if you don't do that then you are paying $25,000 per set of parameters to be under the hood. and i know peter agrees with me, keeping the technology open just like your example of the internet, we have got to keep it open. the u.s. is not a leader in this technology. i think the western world was leading at. >> i know i'm way over time so real quickly, the underlying code proprietary manufacture for the common script? >> proprietary, the materials that you read the machine on. >> if i want to design and do some coding and i'm a decade old out of date programmer. >> i'm going to let john jump on that one.

>> well i think if i understand the question correctly the capability of sending a file --. >> proprietary has software for each manufacturer. >> the software will allow you to print a part. i will answer in two ways. the software that allows you to have access to the printer is common. it's called an stl file. that is common to all the different companies that are out there. then what is proprietary would be actually how the printer prints. each one of them uses a variety of different technologies and parameters so that would be proprietary if that answers your question. >> mr. chairman thank you for your patience with me. thank you. >> each of you brought a variety of things and we will start with mr. o'neill. can you tell us what you have got in front of you and show it off? >> as i said before we have to

bring parts quickly because the iphone refreshes every year and it usually refreshes around september or october so to get the products into the stores for the holiday season we have to be very quick. whenever there are rumors on the internet we will take those rumors and take the specification and print a copy of an iphone, 3-d-based on the rumors and then we will print a product that will hold our lenses and clip to see how it fits, see how well it works and evaluate whether we are happy with that. we will keep working on this all through the rumors. every time there's a a rumor readable to anyone and we will do hundreds of designs of the product to get it right. when i'm sure apple actually does release the phone then we have got this product we can put on there and test our lenses on the new device and test the fit and see how it is and if we are happy with everything we will send it out to manufacturing and have tooling made so we can do injection molding and then we

are in production and that process takes six to eight weeks. >> mr. cobb? >> picking up on what pat was talking about but this particular part was a part that really gets to the idea of taking a prototype into a realistic area. what we have done is utilized the printing process similar to an inkjet renter but it gives you really the realism that you get from a part and that is what a manufacture or designers looking for. in the particular process we are using call poly-jet what it allows us to do is make it to real so you have something very durable but at the same time you are printing this flexible material here as well. this was printed all is one part just recently we introduced the capability of the material and we have added color to that so you can accident and print in

this case a prototype shoe but a very realistic prototype shoe that most people coming here looking at this you would probably think it was the real thing. getting towards the idea of real things as particular product is a different technology that we have called ftm. this particular technology takes thermoplastic so poly-carbonates are being used today in manufacturing typically in the injection mold process but in this particular case this was printed again with 18 different components here. this was all rented in one particular piece. from our prototyping standpoint it allows you to look at a lot of different things going on. it's not just an individual part. it's an assembly and this prototype of technology allows you to look at those assembliesd function an issue look further you can also because it's real

thermoplastics these are types of materials being used in real life today for use parts in aerospace and automotive and consumer goods. >> well i rode a friday of products. it's so hard to choose because there are so many people who are creative. my testimony i used an example of men's jewelry. these are cufflinks that are made of sterling silver and they are for sale on our platform and they also sell it in a different way. that is one example. another that is really cool is an almost organic movement from the space program. there's a very passionate community behind it and if you figure out hey take them from

the game and tournament to the real thing. it went viral and everybody now wants to have them. two very different examples. i mentioned nervous systems. they use algorithm so they don't design it by hand. they write computer codes that mimic nature and by doing that they can create unique items all the time. this is an example of a lampshade. you can go on their web site and you can go on shapeaways and find these products. they are for sale and ms. baum brought another product which is it customizable mattress also from the system. it's a wide variety of jewelry to lighting fixtures to gadgets and game accessories and i could go on for hours but i won't.

>> right now i'm wishing i had selected my samples a little bit differently. i had had some schools sitting school setting up here and the face transplant model that dr. rodriguez did a year ago. the other thing i wish i had brought is an example of 3-d printing with traditional metal plating of over the top of that. one of the companies in maryland play specifically on 3-d objects extending the life of the press press -- plastic rented some of the work they do is highly classified. what is in the knowledge center at 3-d maryland is a one tenth scale thruster that they made for boeing and those objects are really impressive. what i have in front of me are some souls from under armour. under armour is a anchor business. that is as much as i'm able to say. i am close friends with under armour and frequently behind the door with them so right now they are prototyping souls. this is a watch and this is off of one of mr. cobb's system.

it's very flexible and very rigid material at this time time. this is an end use process located in maryland and this is in and use parts of prototyping and used parts. this is a metzl printed part that had post-machining production done on it. i would tag on with peter about the subtle guy. this particular printer prints in full color and we talk about entrepreneurs and we talk about the uses of the technology. if you take a 3-d photograph of yourself or your daughter or grandchildren and you want to have that replicated into a doll your kids can have dolls that look like them if that is what you want to do. mickey labs is doing that in the u.k.. it uses the color-coded parts of the tools as they put it through production so orange is one division, green is another division in the code the parts individually. that is just inherent to the

technology in the last sample that i have that i will talk about is this architectural model. we are all old enough to understand architectural models before 3-d printing were made from map war. today we can print the prototype of the building. there's a saying in the industry that is a picture is worth a thousand words a prototype is worth a thousand pictures and as a society that is more and more visual arbiter sea can become more visual. that is more and more true. lastly in my testimony and included a nice profile of the company in baltimore and is it traditional foundry. it is a wonderful american family story. it is family owned business three or four generations and they started losing their pattern makers. they said how are we going to solve this problem? they didn't want to see the successful business change so they adopt a 3-d printing in 2010. they have a number of machines.

they say that they send a prototype of the objects they are going to create for the defense industry with successful bids. >> you all bring up an interesting point. in terms of the different mediums that you print with how does that translate into durability or strength or whatever the case might he and i will let anyone of you answer if you want to. >> one going to point the finger to mr. cobb because he has the highest of the materials. >> the balco varbusiness is and thermoplastic area and i talk about the nylons and poly-carbonates eds. traditional manufacturing would be utilizing in injection molding process to bring those parts. we don't quite do that. we don't melted and put pressure into it. we use a layer of technology that we have talked about in the

past and so the characteristics of that are different than the traditional injection molding. we are using real a ds real nylon and real polycarbonate. there is a wide variety of manufacturers around the world. we just select one of those of the difference is not in the material itself. the differences in the way the parts are manufactured. when i was talking a little bit earlier we talked about having the knowledge from a designer, the knowledge from a toolmaker and the knowledge from a manufacturer to understand that the 3-d printed part is in our case a real thermoplastic but made differently than the traditional injection molding. injection molding is going to round for a long time. there is a handbook that really talks about injection molding the principles to make sure it's a durable part. there is no such thing for 3-d

printing in manufacturing today and is the technology evolves the materials evolve and their evolving every single day having that knowledge to understand differences between the injection molded part and the thermoplastic and the 3-d printed heart is going to be important in producing more and more parts for end-users because they can be used to utilizing 3-d printing and they are used in 3-d printing today but it's a different design than the manufacturing method. it's different. >> lets say you don't have a drawing or you don't -- just in the restoration industry out of curiosity can you take an existing worn-out part and create data points and turn around and reproduce back? and how expensive is this for somebody like if they employed or call somebody? the office they don't want to buy the technology themselves and they would just as soon have

somebody do it for them. how expensive is it to create that part as a model? >> you can use canning technologies that are more powerful today. in the same way you can take a part and if it's still in one piece you could scan it. not all parts can be scanned however. it's going to be very hard to scan this part but you know more simple products you could easily scan and those scanners are getting very affordable. they take the multicam print and printed in a wide variety of materials. ..

>> next, elizabeth kolbert discu discusses her new book "the sixth extinction: an unnatural history" and she is rg