Video: 'Candy’ 3D-Prints Your Sweets

A London-based company has added some sweetness to the versatility of the 3D printing market with a printer designed solely to print candy and confections. Aptly dubbed "Candy," the printer is the work of 3D Ventures, which is targeting everyone from the hobbyist at-home baker to pastry chefs who need to churn out confections on a more regular and efficient basis, Razvan Creanga, CEO and founder of 3D Ventures, tells Design News in an interview.

"Our challenge was to create a high-end, professional-grade confectionery-focused printer precise enough to feature in a pastry chef's arsenal and intuitive and affordable enough to become a staple of the family kitchen," he tells us.

The company began working on the technology about a year ago with help from funding from an angel investor, Creanga says. While he realizes Candy isn't the first food-oriented 3D printer, he hopes the printer will be the first one that's truly accessible as a consumer product. "The concept of 3D printing in general is so new, everyone is still experimenting with the technology and what it means for the future. That's why going with confectionery design seemed like a logical entry point into food, because of how naturally creative it is."

To make Candy attractive and accessible for both home users and professionals, 3D Ventures is keeping the design simple and the price point affordable, with a retail price tag of $599. The printer features a sleek, modern, compact design, looking not unlike a colorful food scale. At the bottom of the design is an LCD screen for viewing printer presets and controls.

Candy can print using any semi-solid foodstuff: chocolate, peanut butter, sugar icing, creams, marzipan, ketchup, dough, ice cream, or a variety of other pastes, he says. It also comes pre-equipped with programmed confectionary designs and a plug-and-play electric extruder that makes the printer well-suited for printing sweets, he says.

3D Ventures is in the middle of a Kickstarter campaign to raise GB pound 60,000, or just under $100,000, to scale up production of the printers, he says. "The pre-production prototype of Candy has been designed, and it's working perfectly," he tells us. "We now need to be able to ramp up production of Candy to the scale that we require."

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