3D printing company delivers vital supplies to front line of Covid-19 fight
▶ The Dubai company swapped clients such as Emirates and Adidas for Dubai Police and Sharjah hospitals amid crisis,
Seven years ago, Pir Arkam became the first person to build a 3D printer in his native Pakistan. His alma mater, Mehran University of Engineering & Technology, still boasts about his achievement in marketing materials – even though the first object he produced was a whistle incapable of producing sound.
However, after thousands of attempts, a master’s degree in robotics and automation and a move to Dubai, Mr Arkam’s work is much more than a passing university hobby. His start-up, Proto21, now provides life-saving materials to those on the front line of the Covid-19 battle in the UAE.
His story is one of many across the globe of a 3D-printing workshop transforming its output in the face of the pandemic.
For the past few months, startups, labs at universities and big multinationals such as General Electric, Hewlett-Packard and Volkswagen have used the technology to make masks and face shields for medical professionals and ventilator splitters for hospitals.
For Mr Arkam, a business owner with 17 employees and numerous contracts, news of the coronavirus was scary.
“When the pandemic began, business went away. I thought we would not be able to pay salaries. But then, suddenly, I got a call,” he says. The words were a welcome relief: “You’ve got a project.”
Before the pandemic, the Proto21 facility in Jebel Ali operated up to 18 hours a day during its two-year existence, with its 40 printers churning out more than a thousand projects for some of the country’s biggest brands.
For Expo 2020 Dubai, Mr Arkam and his team worked with UAE students to turn ideas into functional prototypes, during a lesson on innovation.
For the UAE Ministry of Defence, Proto21 made a topological map of the Middle East. A 3.5-metre-long drill bit at Adnoc’s Abu Dhabi headquarters came out of Proto21’s workshop, and Emirates Airlines relies on Mr Arkam for 3D-printed parts for its maintenance department.
But today, those 18-hour shifts look a bit different. Proto21 is printing thousands of face shields every week for Dubai Police, the Dubai Health Authority, hotels and retail outlets such as Sacoor Brothers, and individual doctors who get free deliveries to their door if they ask.
The team is using different designs pulled from open sourcing, such as the design Apple made available. Depending on whether the shield will be used by doctors working a 12-hour shift in a clinical setting, or a police officer out on patrol during the sticky summer months in Dubai, the face masks are tailored to those needs: indoor or outdoor, length of wear and temperature exposure.
However, taking these variables into account can be challenging as it is not as
straightforward as simply pressing “print”.
The 3D production method, also known as additive manufacturing, is a process of making three dimensional solid objects from a digital file. Proponents of 3D printing say it is the most precise, cost-effective and fastest way to produce goods, allowing complex shapes to be made using less material than traditional manufacturing methods.
The 3D-printed object is made by laying down successive layers of material, usually plastics, metals or polymers, until the object is created. Each layer is a thin, horizontal cross-section of the final product.
Before Covid-19, the size of the global 3D printing materials market was projected to reach $3.78 billion (Dh13.88bn) by 2026, growing by a compound annual basis of 12 per cent during the forecast period, according to a May report from Fortune Business Insights.
The aerospace sector was listed as one of the main growth drivers for this market, according to the report, which points out that the industry has been harnessing 3D-printing technology over the past few decades to build design prototypes.
Recent breakthroughs using 3D printing show huge potential, according to Fortune.
In Europe, for example, additive manufacturing is being used to produce implants and prosthetics for the healthcare sector. In the Asia-Pacific region, 3D-printing materials are used in industries such as automotive, health care and defence.
Within a few short years, 3D printing has gone from a niche manufacturing method to opening new frontiers for scientific research and modern production.
The Covid-19 pandemic has made it a mainstream solution after supply chains were upended by the public health response to curb the spread of the virus, and demand for personal protective equipment surged.
Mr Arkam is used to a challenge. He sold his car in Pakistan to start his 3D-printing business in Dubai in 2018. He started out alone, offering training courses on the production method to businesses in the GCC.
The Joseph Group, a large manufacturing company in Dubai that makes much of the signage throughout the UAE, took him up on his offer to learn the basics of 3D printing. They were so impressed by what he taught them that just a few months into business, Mr Arkam sold his company to the group for an undisclosed sum, retaining 25 per cent ownership but ceding control.
“It was the best decision of my life,” Mr Arkam says. The acquisition allowed him to invest in equipment and quickly grow the business, which came easy for an entrepreneur obsessed with sales.
“Wolf of Wall Street is my kind of story,” he says.
Before starting Proto21, he worked at a call centre where he made 150 calls a day to sell 3D technology to businesses in the UK. It was good practice, he says.
But now, his purpose is to be of service.
These days, instead of manufacturing product models for Adidas or Pantene, the company is printing ventilator splitters for Sharjah hospitals to enable one ventilator to treat several patients.
It is also making Charlotte valves that can be attached to snorkelling masks to make them reusable full-face PPE for doctors at Al Rashid Hospital and for some Abu Dhabi ambulance staff.
Some of this work is being done completely free of cost.
“From childhood I was interested in robotics and electronics. I would break my toys to see what was in there,” he says.
He was first professionally introduced to 3D printing when he was awarded a scholarship for an exchange semester at the University of Huntsville in Alabama in 2012.
“I was fascinated,” he says. “It was the world’s first self-replicating device. A 3D printer can print half of its parts for another 3D printer.”
He decided he wanted to introduce this technology to his home country and made building a printer his final-year project.
“At that time, it was more as a hobby,” he says.
But today, he dreams of replacing limbs and teeth using bio-ink derived from someone’s DNA. He thinks about sending a 3D printer to Mars and using Martian soil to build homes.
For now, he is helping Earth overcome one of its biggest challenges. For someone who could not afford the materials he needed to do his work only two years ago, Mr Arkam is already exceeding his own expectations.