Uber-Styled Digital Platform Bulldozing its Way into American Manufacturing

Uber has impacted the taxi cab service world like a giant asteroid colliding with a planet. Since its inception, it has been plowing a wide swath of disintegration among conventional cab services, as its new way of doing business has been a colossal disruptor.

Before Uber, taxi service was considered “old-school” and ripe for change and improvement. Like many industries that are invaded by snappy young upstarts or game-changing technology, taxi service providers have been slow to respond in a significant and positive manner. In essence, the taxi cab service is to passengers what Blockbuster was to videos.

Woe to the businesses who fail to anticipate an industry paradigm shift or who fail to respond to momentous change with a forcible counter-approach. It was inevitable that someone would eventually draw on the success of the Uber platform and develop it for the manufacturing industry.

Wake-Up Call to Manufacturers!

The Uber model of offering services has entered the world of manufacturing and promises to transform the American manufacturing landscape like the Uber asteroid did to taxi cab service.

In less than four years, two companies—MakeTime and Xometry—have quietly, yet with brute force, been bulldozing their way through American industry by offering a whole new way to get products made. Their impact affects the smallest job shops to the largest manufacturing behemoths.

Their offering? An on-demand manufacturing platform that weds companies who want to have parts made to companies or shops that can make those parts. For the first time, product designers can instantly access a singular platform putting them in touch with more than 2,000 manufacturers and job shops across America, where they can submit their request for quotation (RFQs) and receive bids from facilities that have been vetted and approved to produce high-quality parts. What used to take weeks or months can now be done in days.

Need a part made? Use their online dashboard, upload the CAD drawings and specs, and wait for the bids to come to you.

If you’re a company that needs:

• CNC Machining
• Sheet Metal Fabrication
• Injection Molding
• Selective Laser Sintering (SLS)
• CNC Milling
• Waterjet Cutting
• Urethane Casting
• Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS)
• CNC Turning
• Laser Cutting
• Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM)
• And more…

Practically anything you need made can be tasked in this nationwide network of machine shops.

Xometry recently purchased MakeTime (created in 2015) and both were created to solve two basic problems.

Problem 1: Engineers, product designers, and procurement officers found  it extremely difficult and time consuming to find go-to manufacturing resources. They spent days sending out RFQs, waiting for feedback, sending drawings, asking for different quantities, waiting for more feedback, only to receiveless than optimal pricing and lead times. On top of that, designers were not always fully aware of the capabilities and limitations of the latest manufacturing technology advances.

Problem 2: Machine shops spent a great deal of time and energy responding to inquiries for custom parts that ultimately did not turn into orders. In addition, without extensive sales and marketing resources, many of these shops were limited to working with customers in their local area, making it difficult to grow their businesses.

Problems Solved
Now there is a singular resource that companies can turn to for their manufacturing needs, while machine shops all over America have access to a gigantic new customer base. For both, it’s a win-win in that the simplicity of the platform and the enormous time savings benefits all parties.

10,000 customers and growing have access to the Xometry algorithm that sends jobs to a list of carefully vetted facilities with matched capabilities. Xometry’s platform makes it possible for customers to receive instant pricing, expected lead times, and manufacturability feedback. Plus, Xometry’s Project Engineering team is always responsible for making sure the parts are manufactured correctly and on-time.

Manufacturing: A Whole New World

The real takeaway here is not so much that there is an amazing ordering platform that connects manufacturing suppliers to buyers. It’s that manufacturing is evolving and transforming itself in ways that, just ten years ago, would have been unimaginable. If your internal practices, methods or procedures look like business as usual, they are probably outdated and have been replaced by new methodology.

For example, the days of spreadsheet-laden businesses and magnetic scheduling boards are long gone. Your competitors are moving to digital processes that are way faster, far more accurate, efficient, and easier to use. Manufacturers with their eyes on tomorrow are streamlining processes and choosing the path of least resistance, which means more digital execution (DX). Here are a few more examples of smart manufacturing practices.

• Timely Information: Smart manufacturers are getting their information in real-time, while outdated firms are relying on next-day information, spreadsheets, paper timesheets, etc. We have seen too many companies continuing to embrace old, worn out methods that slow down throughput in the backoffice and on the shop floor. The entire organization pays the price.
• Digital Execution (DX): This is the process of moving to higher levels of automation. While the experts are talking about Industry 4.0, including Industrial Internet of Things, predictive analytics and more, there are still game changing, lever moving benefits that can be implemented that are more realistic, with less disruption for a majority of small to medium sized manufacturers. Most companies could use more “easy” buttons that perform series of highly repetitive tasks throughout the organization that are far faster than traditional manual methods.
• Digitize and Democratize: Paper-based schedules, plus everything else accomplished using paper, add work and lack efficiency. Smart manufacturers have moved on to digitizing the workforce operations creating an instantaneous communication stream throughout the entire organization. This communication stream goes two ways. The first is in collecting data (Digitize); the second is disseminating information (Democratize). Done correctly, vital information reaches everyone in the organization in real-time, right at the point of need.

Just as Uber was followed by Lyft, you can likely expect to see another challenger with their all-new instant quoting platform come along too. However, one thing is for certain: manufacturers are entering a whole new world of doing business and those who adapt will survive. Getting your business on the Right-Trak™ enables you to do be more competitive and allow you to keep pace with these changing developments in manufacturing. When you put your business on the Right-Trak, you create an Unfair Advantage for your organization over the competition and drive your bottom line faster than your top line.

Contact us today and we will show you the Right-Trak™ to a business and competitive advantage. It’s what we do so well.