3DBuds

Inspiration

The people who need 3D printed parts have to choose a supplier manually. With the growth rate of the 3D printing industry, the process of manually selecting a supplier cannot satisfy the customer. 3DBuds fixes this problem by distributing the orders using a smart matching algorithm between the customers and the suppliers. So we can fulfill the orders quickly and at a minimum cost. We have done field research and identified that there is a significant market opportunity.

What it does

3DBuds is the platform that matches customers with the suppliers such that customers receive their orders faster and cheaper, while the suppliers produce and profit more.

How I built it

We have built it by identifying the key issues our competition is lacking at and acquired data about how we can beat them. We did field research by learning about the complaints of the customers and hubs of 3dhubs.com. We have created a web application that will distribute the orders from the customers using a smart matching algorithm between our customers and suppliers.

Challenges I ran into

It was challenging to create a map of supplier using the google.maps API.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

We have been able to develop a functioning demo with just two members. We have also identified a real-life opportunity and formulated a business that can grow and be sustainable.

What I learned

We learned the importance of applying agile development to quickly improve our ideas through rapid prototyping and getting feedback,

What's next for 3DBuds

Next steps are to create a fully functioning database and a sleek web page. We will capture the customer and supplier base our competitor built over the years by significantly superior performance and benefits to both the customer and the supplier.