Prusa Research is such a printer factory. And for the money. With an EBITDA of around half a billion crowns a year, its shareholders, led by Josef Průša, are already thinking about what to do next with the money. For example, they launched an accelerator at the Prusa Lab workshop to help develop hardware projects.
In the first year, they supported three. The first of these is called Posedla and is typically developing customized bicycle saddles. The second is the ambitious Vanilla Robotics, whose domain is small autonomous vans. The third has an overlap with the world of art and is called Audire Fluctus.
“It’s time to give back,” said Josef Průša during Tuesday’s presentation, where he also announced that an investment had already been made in one of the supported projects. He bought a minority stake in the first mentioned company Posedla for 15 million crowns.
“I’m absolutely blown away by the fact that within a year the idea became ready for production,” the young billionaire proudly commented on the investment. Enthusiastic cyclists Jiří Dužár and Martin Řípa are behind the project, who did not spare praise for the accelerator.
“When we said we needed a carbon workshop, we had it in a month. Thanks to the accelerator, we were simply able to try so many things that we finally made it, ”Řípa praised himself. The young company should use the saddles to create a custom saddle, the real sale and expedition should start the young company within a month.
However, this is not the first investment for Průš itself. Last summer, they invested in the Worldee travel platform in tandem with business partner and namesake Ondřej Průša. In March this year, together with the Nation1 fund of Marek Moravec, they supported the Pealock startup, which is developing a smart lock.
However, the main face of the 3D printing empire is already looking forward to applications for the next round of the accelerator and emphasizes that it will focus more on sustainability in the second call. “Even in my wildest dream, I never imagined it would turn out so well. That there are so many creative people who are able to get the ideas to an end, “he concluded billionaire Průša.
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