Watch Video: Adidas Reveals Its First 3D-Printed Shoes It’ll Mass Produce In Near Future

Popular shoemaker Adidas revealed their latest 3D printed shoe ‘Futurecraft 4Ds’ and they also announced its mass production. Adidas plans on selling as many as 5,000 pairs this upcoming season, which will increase to 1,000,000 pairs by the end of 2018.

Watch the video here:

To create these shoes, Adidas has partnered with Carbon, a Silicon Valley-based 3D printing company. This startup company has raised funds over $200 million from Sequoia Capital, Yuri Milner, GV among others. Carbon aims at making 3D printing a viable manufacturing method for large scale production across industries.

The technique used behind this is Digital Light Synthesis, by this, the company is able to print 10 times faster than the other 3D printers. Moreover, Carbon’s process is continuous and starts from the bottom, unlike the traditional 3D printers which prints layer by layer from the top. The liquid resin material is more flexible when compared to the material used in 3D printers.

An athlete needs different points of densities in their sole so as to get the best performance i.e., the sole should have a firm toe spot and softer heel and to achieve this Carbon’s 3D printing is getting out the perfect geometry with varying densities.

Adidas, in future, will allow its customers to customize their sole of the shoes and everyone can have their own printed shoes.