From San Fran to the Yo: Rugged 3D joins YBI

YOUNGSTOWN — The way Collin Boring looks at it, Rugged 3D had to leave its heart in San Francisco and relocate to the Youngstown Business Incubator Technology Campus.

"If YBI would have been on the moon, we'd be going there, too," Boring, Rugged 3D's chief technology officer, said Tuesday as the announcement was made during the virtual Regional Economic Diversification Summit at Youngstown State University.

Rugged 3D makes portable and durable 3D printers that can be used in harsh environments. The company was cofounded by Boring and his brother, Micah Tindor, both Ohio natives.

They used their engineering and military backgrounds to start the company in San Francisco, which isn't a place focused on 3D printing, Boring said. They sought areas where the company could learn from other industry experts in additive manufacturing.

Boring said YBI was the best fit to gain industry knowledge and get the connections and network needed to advance the company's products and capabilities.

"We started investigating trying to find what region where we can go to learn from other industry experts on additive manufacturing, and that's kind of when YBI stood out to us," Boring said.

America Makes was established in 2012 at the Youngstown Business Incubator and is the flagship institute for Manufacturing USA, the National Network for Manufacturing Innovation. Its goal was to create a successful environment for additive manufacturing in Youngstown.

Youngstown Business Incubator CEO Barb Ewing credited the U.S. Economic Development Administration, the state of Ohio and the city of Youngstown for allowing YBI to purchased and renovate the 65,000-square-foot former home of The Vindicator three years ago as part of its Youngstown's Technology Campus.

The building is now a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility that holds 10 companies, now including Rugged 3D.

Boring said the company started when he and Micah researched problems with what the military was using as alternatives to 3D printers.

"My brother being a copilot experienced a lot of part failures in the field, and we started researching this problem on 3D printers and saw what the military was using as an alternative," Boring said.

The military was using 3D printers in shipping containers or desktop 3D printers, which often resulted in failures due to missing parts or breaking in the field.

Ewing said the only two employees of the company right now are the founders, and they are already working in the YBI building as a start-up to launch the product and to hire more employees.

YBI is building an additive manufacturing cluster not just in Youngstown but in all of Northeast Ohio and is always hoping to expand with new partners, new collaborations and new opportunities for jobs, Ewing said.



"I think it will also help to showcase how much capacity Youngstown and Northeast Ohio have in additive manufacturing as a whole and very likely will draw some other companies to take a look to see what we have and why this is the right place to launch their additive manufacturing company," Ewing said.

This story was originally published September 2, 2020 at 4:11 AM with the headline "From San Fran to the Yo: Rugged 3D joins YBI."