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The race to make AM ‘faster’ often misses the point completely. For as long as applications continue to rely on specialised CAD skills and time-consuming manual CAD drawing, the amount of 3D Printing an organisation achieves will not be impacted by the print time so much as the time it takes to go from problem to printable model.
Stratasys is addressing this by integrating the Additive App Suite, developed by German design automation specialist trinckle, into its GrabCAD offerings. Automated design apps for common industrial applications — clamping jaws, shadow boards and drill guides among them — will be embedded directly into GrabCAD Print and GrabCAD Print Pro, with a summer 2026 launch planned for an initial ten apps. The stated milestone for expanding that to fifteen will be this year’s Formnext in November.
The intent is to push AM adoption beyond dedicated additive teams to engineering, quality and operations functions, allowing manufacturers to move from a production problem to a print-ready solution without leaving their existing workflow. In short, the company wants more people to be able to access 3D printing within their roles, without needing to learn an onerous new skillset. Individual and enterprise licensing options are designed to lower the barrier from trial to full deployment.
For Stratasys, the integrations of the Additive App Suite and Fixturemate mark a step in a broader platform ambition for GrabCAD: moving it from print preparation software towards a connected application ecosystem optimised for Stratasys hardware.
Further information:
Stratasys.com
AM Directory/Stratasys
Trinckle.com
AM Directory/Trinckle
