In 2002, Taiwanese professor Jeng-Ywan Jeng went to the US to visit 3D Systems and pitched his idea for a revolutionary technology. At the time, 3D printing was not a buzzword yet. Rather, what South Carolina-based 3D Systems did was better known as rapid prototyping. A laser was used to trace a digital design in a vat of liquid photosensitive polymers. Jeng, then a visiting research scholar at the Univer sity of California, Santa Barbara spe cialising in laser packaging research, proposed that instead of using a single laser beam to trace each point, 3D Systems should adopt a pro ject ion method. “If you move the laser point by point, it will take a long time. But if you have a projection-type laser, then it’s just like a stamp.”

The folks at 3D Systems, Jeng recalls, were not all that interested. “At the time, they didn’t pay any attention to me,” he recalls. “But in 2013, 3D Systems released a projection-type printer.” Jeng, currently professor of mechanical engineering at the National Taiwan University of Science and Technology ( Taiwan Tech) as well as president of the 3D Printing Association Taiwan, does not begrudge their rejection of his early proposal. “For that time, they were probably right because the 3D printing industry had not taken off yet.”

With the industry having developed rapidly since, Jeng now has a new idea for what could represent the next leap forward. At the Inside 3D Printing Con ference & Expo held in Singapore early this year, he showed off a working prototype of his smartphone intelligent 3D printer. Powered entirely by a smartphone, it can produce trinkets with a fair amount of accuracy and at a relatively low cost. Jeng holds out a star-shaped pendant, about the size of a coin. Printing this, he says, would cost about US$20 ($27.45).

The prototype is not much to look at. There is a tray where you place your smartphone, screen facing up. Sitting atop this screen is a flimsy-looking piece of plastic, called the photopolymer tank. This is where the ink is placed so it can be exposed to the light coming from the smartphone. Joined to one end of this rectangular tray is what Jeng calls the Z-axis. Where X and Y represent the length and width of your smartphone, the Z-axis supports a build platform above the photopolymer tank. As bits of photopolymer are exposed to light, they adhere to this build platform. The Z-axis allows the platform to gradually move upwards, away from the surface of the tank, as the item is printed.

Can a 3D printer be free?
Jeng believes his smartphone-powered 3D printer is revolutionary in several ways. For one thing, the printer itself costs hardly anything to manufacture because the expensive technology it relies on comes entirely from the smartphone. The 3D printer is connected to the smartphone via Bluetooth, and the smartphone taps the cloud for additional storage and computing capacity.

“The total cost of the Z-axis and control board is around US$30. This case [for the smartphone], if you have a large quantity, is several dollars. And this plastic tank will be a few cents, although actually there’s a lot of techno logy inside,” he says. The total cost of the printer could be brought down to less than US$50, Jeng adds. “Plus marketing cost, you should be able to price it at less than US$100.”

In fact, he thinks it might even make sense for manufacturers to give a 3D printer away with a smartphone purchase some day in the future. “If it costs less than US$100 to make, why would you sell it? Instead, you could use it to push people to buy new smartphones.”

Companies could also make money by selling the software powering the 3D printer and operating in the smartphone. “Most 3D printing companies today are focused on the hardware. But actually, software is the most important in the future. You don’t need to have very strong hardware because everything is in the cloud. This is why you use the smartphone.”

Unlike the 3D printers that exist in the market today, Jeng’s smartphone-powered printer uses very little material and can print small items quickly. Only certain sections of the photopolymer are exposed to light, which means there is less wastage.

The best ideas
Jeng has spent much of his career in academia. He has a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan and a master of science in advanced manufacturing technology from the University of Manchester. He completed his PhD in laser material processing at the University of Liverpool in 1992 and has since then been attached to Taiwan Tech.

Over the years, his job took him places. Among the most exciting postings, he says, was to Moscow, where he served as diplomatic director for science and technology cooperation between Taiwan and Russia. These days, Jeng splits his time between lectures, consulting for companies and tinkering in his laboratory. Does he plan to quit his job and start a company to market his 3D printer?

Ultimately, Jeng says he hopes a company will come along and acquire or license the technology. “I am an academic professor, not a commercial person. I am not familiar with marketing [or] production. This is another set of technologies and experience. I can transfer the technology. Of course, my students can work for the company. They are good. That’s the best way.”

In fact, Jeng says academics are probably at their best diving into research rather than hunting for technologies that can be commercialised. “At universities, we have no limits [to our research]. We keep [an] open mind and have lots of discussions with our students. A lot of my ideas come from lectures and student discussions.”

At the moment, he is working on perfecting the software for the printer. “For makers, right now our software is good enough. But we are not happy with just makers because this machine is not for makers,” says Jeng, using the industry term for serious DIY hobbyists. “It’s for consumers. I don’t think someone would want to learn computer- aided design just to design some jewel lery and print it out.”

For such a mass-market product to succeed, he says, it needs to be easy enough for the public to use. So, he is working on a photo-capture system that will allow designs for 3D printing to be created using pictures captured on a smartphone.

What else does he have in mind? “The mobile phone is probably one of the most important inventions in the world. There are so many functions of the mobile phone that we are still not using. We are trying to use them,” Jeng says. “But I had better not say any more.”

This article appeared in the Enterprise of Issue 722 (April 4) of The Edge Singapore.