HP announced its future commitment to 3D printing technologies at its recent press event at additive manufacturing trade show Formnext in Frankfurt, Germany, unveiling a revamp to its technology and materials line-up.
New powders for its prized Metal Jet ecosystem expanded the potential applications for the S100 3D printer with ‘performance metals’. This included Copper and Silver, Inconels and OptiPowder superalloys through partnerships with the likes of GKN, Continuum Powders and IndoMIM.
With the Metal Jet line having been the focus of HP’s 3D printing ambition for the past few years, the announcement that followed was most unexpected. A new polymers machine – and a filament one at that.
The HP Industrial Filament 3D Printer 600 High Temperature (HP IF 600HT), is billed as a modular system designed for printing high temperature and engineered filaments. A second system, the HP Industrial Filament 1000 XL, will be introduced in the second half of 2026 with focus on producing large parts,
The HP IF 600HT comes ready with HP branded materials – PEI, PEEK, PEEK-CF, PAEK, ABS, PC, PA-CF – with the machine preloaded with settings and parameters to print these. Yet HP is clearly looking to step on some toes in this sector, and has opened the door to third-party filament manufacturers.
“Built on an open materials platform and supported by HP’s global service network, HP Industrial Filament 3D Printer Solutions give manufacturers the flexibility to innovate with a wide range of polymers and scale into new applications while maintaining industrial-grade performance,” reads the sales spokesperson.
A few questions to the onsite team at Formnext suggests that this machine has not been developed in the heart of its AM department in Barcelona, but by a ‘trusted partner’ with over a decade of experience in producing FDM machines. Given that the HP IF 600HT looks not dissimilar to that of Polish manufacturer 3DGence’s Industry line of FDM 3D printers for engineering materials and boasts similar specs, we might safely assume this is the basis for the machine.
Rebadging an FDM 3D Printer from another manufacturer formed the early days of HP’s additive ambitions – although back then it was a Stratasys unit. Today, it looks like the HP IF 600HT is instead being directly positioned to go to war with Stratasys’ industrial range. Priced at little over £100,000, the specs of HP’s new machine puts itself in a gap between Stratasys’ F370 and F450 3D printers.
Given the rise of competitors in the FDM sector, the move looks like a play for the wider industrial ecosystem and directly at Stratasys – whose SAF powder bed fusion technology competes with HP’s MJF – and its strong grip on the industrial market’s sales channel.
After a bumpy few years mixed up in the swirl of M&A, no new machines announced for the coming year, all at a time where its entry level sales are being eaten into by new open format desktop machines, and a brand the size of HP now targeting its top end, it looks like Stratasys has a fight on its hands.
Away from the business side of the equation, the question remains for users how different the new HP FDM machine is its potentially donor machine? A 3DGence unit can be picked up for around £50,000, while its three cabinet material management system (again, near identical to the HP version) is nearly half the price HP is charging.
At a time where more ‘professional’ users are jumping to ‘hobbyist’ machines – with the differences in performance between the two terms now a very blurred line – it seems that sales and support channels for big clients might be the differentiator the legacy brands find themselves fighting over.
HP AM SVP & GM Alex Moñino greeted everyone at the Formnext launch with the statement that ‘hesitancy in the wider AM market’ is good for HP: “we’re continuing to invest and we’re here to stay,” he said. At what cost to competitors and users is another question.
