New Patent Filed For 3D Mobile Printing In Trucks

Amazon continues to innovate and think outside the traditional ‘warehouse to customer’ package delivery model. The company has now filed for a patent for 3D printers that could be mounted into trucks and print customer orders ‘on the fly.’ This would vastly cut down the need for importing the same items and eliminate substantial warehousing costs.

An article on Supply Chain 247 elaborates on how 3D printing is affecting supply chains and cost structures. Amazon (which is known to be the largest e-commerce site) is making many strides toward changing the package delivery model and significantly improving delivery times to customers. The company recently proposed delivering packages by way of small drones.

The use of 3D printing is an excellent example of how technology, supply chains and customer service models have all become intertwined.

Will the patent materialize? If it does, how will service models and transportation costs be impacted if 3D Printing and “mobile printing” become used on a mass scale? Will customers be the real winner here?

Photo Source/Credit: amazon.com