Thanks to being "discovered" by U.S. investors, Swedish-based Arcam AB (NASDAQOTH: AMAVF) had an incredible year. As a result, this lesser-known metal 3-D printing company has skyrocketed more than 400%, easily outpacing industry leaders 3D Systems and Stratasys.
Arcam's proprietary electron beam melting, or EBM, technology differentiates itself from the 3-D metal printing crowd, which often uses a process technology called selective laser sintering, or SLS. Like SLS, EBM is an additive manufacturing process that selectively heats and melts a layer of powder-based metal, but instead of using a laser, its uses an electron beam inside of a vacuum chamber.
One of the biggest advantages of EBM over SLS is that it can produce metal parts in significantly less time and at less cost. The only trade-off is that EBM cannot produce parts at the same level of detail that SLS can.
In the following video, 3-D printing analyst Steve Heller reflects back on Arcam's stellar performance, looks forward to Arcam's upcoming opportunity in aviation, and discusses what investors should expect in the year ahead.
