????如果說曾有人懷疑華爾街正熱衷于炒作3D打印概念，那上周隨著花旗集團（Citi）分析師肯尼思?王開始關注3D打印機生產商Stratasys公司和3D Systems公司，這種懷疑自然就煙消云散了。在一份客戶報告中，肯尼思同時還表示，他深信3D打印設備及服務市場到2018年規模將增長到現在的三倍。他寫道，這個市場“正蓄勢待發，將有更多上游生產應用及終端消費市場大規模采用3D技術”。話音剛落，Stratasys和3-D Systems——以及該領域的其他廠商——的股票就應聲飛漲。

????肯尼思?王表示，這個增長背后的推動力量是“隨著客戶開始不再局限于小批量數字化生產而擴大應用范圍時，現有系統的使用率就會隨之提高”。或者說得更明白些，3D打印機的價格正變得日愈低廉，使用更容易，同時適用于打印越來越復雜的物品和設計方案。同時還存在其他推動因素，比如隨著目前這個領域一些限制競爭的關鍵專利到期，3D打印必將在未來幾年里迎來爆發式的增長。

????肯尼思?王并不是第一個做出這個論斷的分析師，不過不管出于什么原因，他斷言看漲的客戶報告還是受到了大眾媒體的追捧，讓3D打印類的股票當天下午一路飄紅。不過，3D打印真的已經到了發展的引爆點嗎？要按造勢媒體的說法，全世界都正在朝著3D打印革命的方向一路飛奔。但是，盡管更廉價的打印機、即將到期的專利和更廣泛的應用都確實有助于推動市場發展——也許也能在未來幾年使目前尚處發端的3D打印市場規模翻上兩番——不過要說這就是桌面生產革命還為時尚早。下面我們來分析一下原因：

1.相關專利確實即將到期，但它們并不是阻礙3D打印發展的因素。

????2014年將到期的專利是激光燒結技術，這是目前市場上3D打印技術中歷史最長、成本最低的專利。激光燒結技術能生產出高分辨率的物品，在某些情況下可與制成品相媲美。不過盡管打印成本不高，但這種打印機的成本卻十分高昂——工業級的打印機造價高達數萬美元。按照現在的說法，由于存在知識產權保護而導致的競爭不足推高了造價，但當這些專利明年到期后這種打印機就會降價，使激光燒結的使用率增加，同時降低3D打印機的整體生產成本。

????但是，認為專利到期就將推動3D打印爆發發展的觀點卻隱含著一個關鍵問題：專利本身并不是阻礙3D打印市場發展的根本因素。

????德勤加拿大分公司（Deloitte Canada）的技術、傳媒和通訊部門研究總監鄧肯?斯圖爾特表示：“之所以說3D打印市場今后并不會比現在更大主要不是因為知識產權問題或專利權歸屬問題。主要是因為，對生產我們現在所需要的絕大多數東西來說，3D打印機速度太慢，成本太高，或是——因為它們所能使用的原材料有諸多限制——它們無法方便地造出我們想要的東西。使3D打印市場無法發展到預期規模的最主要的因素始終在于3D打印機的易用性本身，而不是專利。”

????斯圖爾特稱，這些專利到期能解決成本問題，但卻無法解決功能性這個更為根本的問題，“這些專利到期后確實會有所幫助，但卻無法讓市場發生翻天覆地的變化。”????

????If there was any doubt Wall Street is warming up to 3-D printing it was extinguished last week when Citi analyst Kenneth Wong initiated coverage of 3-D printer manufacturers Stratasys (SSYS) and 3D Systems (DDD), at the same time expressing in a client note that he believes the market for 3-D printing equipment and services will triple by 2018. The market "is on the cusp of seeing much broader adoption across more upstream production applications and the consumer end market," Wong wrote. Shares of Stratasys and 3-D Systems -- as well as others in the space -- spiked.

????"Increased utilization of existing systems as customers start to extend use case beyond small batch digital manufacturing" is behind this growth, Wong says. Or, more plainly, 3-D printers are becoming less expensive, easier to use, and applicable to more -- and more complex -- kinds of objects and designs. Factor in a confluence of other catalysts, like the expiration of key patents that currently discourage competition in the space, and 3-D printing is poised to explode in the next few years.

????Wong isn't the first analyst to make this observation, though for whatever reason his decidedly bullish client note found traction in the popular press, helping to buoy 3-D printing stocks for an afternoon. But has 3-D printing really reached its tipping point? To hear the hype machine tell it, the world is hurtling headlong into a 3-D printing revolution. But while cheaper printers, expiring patents, and a wider range of applications will certainly help drive the market -- and perhaps even triple the value of 3-D printing's nascent marketplace in the near term -- a desktop manufacturing revolution this is not. Here are five reasons why.

1. Patents will expire, but they're not what's holding 3-D printing back

????The patents set to expire in 2014 concern laser sintering, one of the oldest and lowest-cost 3-D printing technologies on the market. Laser sintering can produce high-resolution objects, good enough to be finished products in some cases. But though the cost of printing is low, the cost of the actual printers is quite high -- in the tens of thousands of dollars for industrial grade machines. A lack of competition caused by intellectual property protections keeps that price high, the theory goes, and when those patents expire next year the price of these machines will drop, increasing access to laser sintering technology and lowering the overall cost of manufacturing by 3-D printer.

????However, the idea that expiring patents will fuel an explosion in 3-D printing suffers from a key flaw: Patents aren't really what's holding the 3-D printing market back.

????"The reason 3-D printing isn't bigger than it is today is largely not because of intellectual property issues or who owns what patents," says Duncan Stewart, director of technology, media, and telecommunications research at Deloitte Canada. "It's the fact that for most of the things that we need in the world today, 3-D printers are too slow, too expensive, or that -- because of the limitations in the kinds of materials they can use -- they cannot easily make the things that you want to. The single biggest factor keeping 3-D printing smaller than it might otherwise be up until now has been the utility of 3-D printers, not the patents."

????The expiration of patents addresses one of those issues -- expense -- but it won't solve the more fundamental problem of functionality, Stewart says. "When the patents come off, that will help, but it doesn't suddenly transform the market."??