Directions of the Development of the 3D Printing Industry as Exemplified by the Polish Market

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, also known as Industry 4.0, is about connecting the physical world with the virtual world in real-time. With the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, manufacturing companies are introducing a number of solutions that increase productivity and personalize finished products in line with the idea of Industry 4.0. The application of, among others, the following: 3D printing, the Internet of Things, Big Data, cyber-physical systems, computing clouds, robots (collaborating and mobile), Radio-frequency identification systems, and also quality control and reverse engineering systems, is becoming popular. There are still not enough studies and analyses connected with the Polish 3D printing market, and also attempt to determine the attitude of those studies and analyses to the implementation of the Industry 4.0 conception. In connection with what is stated above, the principal objective of this paper is to determine the directions of the 3D printing industry development. In this publication, it is as well the survey respondents’ opinions relevant to opportunities and threats connected with the implementation of the Industry 4.0 conception in an enterprise are presented. The survey was conducted on a group of 100 enterprises and scientific research institutes in Poland, offering and/or applying additive technologies.