this post was submitted on 14 May 2026
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Louis Rossmann taunts Bambu Lab by hosting banned 3D Printer firmware fork, dares $1 billion company to sue him — more creators pledge support and boycotts, Snapmaker donates equipment to embattled de (www.tomshardware.com)
submitted 1 day ago by commander@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] fonix232@fedia.io 45 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Prusa is pricy because they make the de facto standards - including PrusaSlicer which is the base of OrcaSlicer/Bambu Studio.

Bambu can sell cheaper for two reason:

  • limited research needed to make their own products - they're just copying open patents and software, tuning it a little, and selling the package at manufacturing cost + profit margins
  • the CCP pouring a shitton of money into companies to subsidise them and allow them to undercut western competition. Bambu makes a printer for $1000, CCP pays $600 of it, Bambu sells for $600 - $200 profit
[–] SatyrSack@quokk.au 14 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Prusa is pricy because they make the de facto standards - including PrusaSlicer which is the base of OrcaSlicer/Bambu Studio.

PrusaSlicer itself is just a fork of Slic3r, anyway.

[–] Bazoogle@lemmy.world 5 points 21 hours ago

Open-source slicing has always been built on a tradition of collaboration and attribution. Slic3r, created by Alessandro Ranellucci and the RepRap community, laid the foundation. PrusaSlicer by Prusa Research built on Slic3r and acknowledged that heritage. Bambu Studio in turn forked from PrusaSlicer, and SuperSlicer by @supermerill extended PrusaSlicer with community-driven enhancements. Each project carried the work of its predecessors forward, crediting those who came before.

OrcaSlicer began in that same spirit, drawing from BambuStudio, PrusaSlicer, and ideas inspired by CuraSlicer and SuperSlicer.

Source

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 9 points 1 day ago

PrusaSlicer is a fork of Slic3r.

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca -2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

limited research needed to make their own products - they’re just copying open patents and software, tuning it a little, and selling the package at manufacturing cost + profit margins

So you really have no idea about these printers. Bambu has a dozen patents for novel IP.

"copying open patents" no such thing as an open patent, IP is either patent, or open domain. All printer companies exploit expired patents, including Prusa.

Stratasys is suing Bambu over: Purge Towers, Force Detection, Networked Systems & Smart Spools, but Stratasys are cunts who try to sue anyone. How did they get a patent for purge towers.

[–] fonix232@fedia.io 2 points 21 hours ago

Bambi's contributions are marginal compared to all the prior IP they use (and wasn't Prusa actually suing them for using a number of their patents without the rights?).

as for open patents: any patent that is expired or where the owner isn't interested in enforcing uniqueness (many a things are patented yet in public domain!). by open I simply mean no licensing is required.

And yes, that's precisely what Bambu does. Take open designs, public domain parts and bang them together until they got something working. Which is why I recommend people buy Prusa, not Bambu - reward with some extra spending the people who actually do the hard work, not the ones who swoop in at the end and try to undercut the actual innovators.