A Plano-based company is making its exit.
Following a partnership with one of its portfolio companies in April, Adaptive3D, a maker of polymer materials, has been acquired by Massachusetts 3D printing solutions company Desktop Metal. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.
“This acquisition extends our already strong partnership with EnvisionTEC, enabling us to accelerate our growth into the $129 billion elastomer and flexible foams market,” said Walter Voit, Adaptive3D founder and CEO, in a statement.
Desktop acquired EnvisionTEC, a photopolymer 3D printing solutions company, in February in a deal valued at $300 million. Adaptive3D entered into a distribution agreement with Envision after producing its flagship resin Elastic ToughRubber 90 and other materials. Adaptive3D is the newest Desktop subsidiary, as the company looks to its manufacturing and materials portfolio.
While Adaptive3D will operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Desktop, the company will continue to operate from its Plano headquarters under the leadership of Voit.
At its core, Adaptive3D makes resins that enable tough, strain-tolerant, tear-resistant rubbers optimized for high-throughput manufacturing. Its products have been used in various markets, including health care, consumer, industrial, transportation and oil.
“Combining Adaptive3D’s patented and superior elastomer materials with our printers… will accelerate the adoption of additively manufactured solutions for high-volume, end-use elastomeric parts and products,” said Ric Fulop, founder and CEO of Desktop Metal, in a statement.
Adaptive3D was launched in 2014 out of research conducted at UT Dallas, where Voit is an associate professor and heads up the university’s Advanced Polymer Research Lab, with grant funding from sources like the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.
The company closed on a Series A round co-led by DSM Venturing and Applied Ventures in 2019. It followed that with a Series B round last October led by French materials company the Arkema Group. While the company did not disclose the amounts of either round, following the Series B, Adaptive reported taking a $5.1 million equity investment in a regulatory filing at the time.
For its part, Desktop hopes the deal will help continue its growth. Releasing its first-quarter financial results on Monday, the company said it saw $11.3 million in Q1 revenue, up 35 percent from Q4 and significantly more than the $3.4 million in revenue it saw the same time a year ago. Desktop has more than 470 employees, about 180 more than it had in May of last year.
“The acquisition of Adaptive3D advances Desktop Metal’s vertical integration strategy to grow our portfolio of materials,” Fulop said. “We will continue to search for attractive opportunities to organically and inorganically add to our library of over 225 qualified materials.”
