As industrial and personal 3D printers become capable of making more and more things, it will be more difficult to control products being made by 3D printing and related laws may become increasingly impotent. For example, the Gartner group predicts that "by 2018, 3D printing will result in the loss of at least $100 billion per year in intellectual property globally." Similar predictions, which turned out to be accurate, were made about the music industry in the mid-to-late 1990s. Gartner's prediction seems to be based not only on IP infringement, but also on IP that will never be bought. 3D printing may result in widespread copying, not only of consumer products, but perhaps more importantly, B2B components. Companies that formerly bought replacement parts may start making the parts themselves, or repairing them. To date, little thought has been given to the effects of 3D printing on other areas of the law. In this article, Finnegan attorney John F. Hornick discusses how 3D printing will affect areas of law other than intellectual property.
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