After working as a mechanical design engineer for many years, and because my current job bores me, I'm looking to make a major change in my working life. I hope many of you can give me some suggestions, or suggest people I can contact.
A couple of years ago, when I was set up as a limited company, I purchased two 3D printers, a Formlabs Form 1+ and a Zortrax M200. I still have the M200. I'm now thinking of moving towards a career as a sales and service engineer. Basically selling 3D printers and offering training and servicing of the 3D printers. Given my limited experience using 3D printers, and my many years working in the high tech electronic industry as a mechanical designer, I feel I can leverage my past experience towards becoming an effective a sales person. In my younger years I did work as a sales person and even studied sales a bit.
What do you think? Any ideas who I can contact?
I have done some searches for jobs, but I don't see much happing there. I've also contacted a couple of companies, and I'm continuing to do so, but I'm sure there are other avenues I can take.
I don't know what things are like in Scotland, but here in the US hobbyists refuse to spend much on repairs and would probably be horrified at what a pro would have to charge for service. Professionals are more reasonable but they might be more likely to use a mainstream printer from a manufacturer that offers a maintenance contract.
Someone like David Baldwin (sp?) might be a good person to ask. I believe that he prints with Zortrax professionally. Julia too, but almost certainly does her own repairs.
I would suggest starting a printer company and then circulating a story about a massive order from a globally-known customer, but that would be in poor taste, so I won't.
I would suggest starting a printer company and then circulating a story about a massive order from a globally-known customer, but that would be in poor taste, so I won't.
Whether or not you can make a living as a sales and support/service engineer will have a lot to do with the potential size of your local market and your ability to reach and connect with them. We do "3D Print" professionally (six M200s) our own patented (as of 6/4/16) and patent pending products and offer our engineering services to others for their product development. I do see a decreasing life-span for fused-filament with serious corporate clients. With the successful introduction of "Continuous Liquid Interface Production" (Carbon3D) and similar technologies (Gizmo 3D) the learning curve will continue and as long as you're happy on the bleeding-edge you should be able to establish a nice career.