In December 2014 the editorial team at The Engineer were as excited as the rest of the nation about the prospect of being able to build objects with additive or 3D-printing machines. The team had taken delivery of a CEL Robox micro-manufacturing machine; a 3D printer priced under £1,000 that had entered a consumer market estimated by CEL's calculations to be worth a potential £2.9bn in the UK alone. The emergence of 3D printing for the consumer market was made possible when the patent for fused deposition modelling (FDM) expired in 2009, bringing machines that would normally cost over US$10,000 to below US$1,000, and consequently putting the technology within reach of the burgeoning army of 'makers' that were keen to adopt the technology.
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