What is the Status of Women in the 3D Printing Industry?

International Women’s Day takes place every year on March 8th. According to the United Nations, it is a global day that celebrates the achievements of women around the world as well as the progress that has been made up to this point in attaining gender equality. However, it also serves as a day to reflect on the advancements that still need to be made worldwide in order to truly achieve gender parity. As such, we decided to talk to six influential women in 3D printing, taking to reflect not just on the state of women in 3D printing today, but on how we still need to learn and grow in order to welcome even more women into the field in the future.

The large gender disparities in the STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics ) fields have been a well-known problem for a number of years now. Though women take science classes at the same rate as men in primary and secondary schools, for some reason, they are less likely than their male counterparts to study STEM courses when they reach universities, and even less likely to be working in STEM fields, with the worst disparity present for engineers, a problem also present in AM. To get more insights on the status of women in the field, we spoke with six influential women in the world of additive manufacturing: Michelle Bockman the CEO of 3D Control Systems; Marie Langer the CEO of EOS; Mariel Diaz the CEO and founder of Triditive; Cindy Deekitwong, Global Head of Marketing at Henkel; Anne Debauge, the Digital Director fo Pack&Dev at L’Oréal; and Elena López, the Head of AM at Fraunhofer IWS. We asked them how the presence of women in the 3D printing industry has evolved, what barriers still exist to women participation in AM as well as recommendations they may have to increase the number of women in the industry.

Barriers to Women’s Participation in AM

It is evident that there are still some barriers to participation for women in the additive manufacturing field. For Mariel Diaz, there are three main ones preventing women from becoming more involved: “The barriers mainly fall into three areas: funding, prejudice and inclusiveness. It is necessary to put aside the prejudices against women in the sector, tackle the irrefutable lack of funding for women’s entrepreneurial ideas in the industry and also ask men in the technology what they are doing to increase the number of women in this industry(and not only women.” In her remarks, Diaz also noted that in recruitment it can be difficult to reach the female audience as far fewer women apply to these positions than men. She posits that one way to overcome this barrier is by highlighting female role models already in the industry, making more women and girls see that there is a place for them in the 3D printing industry. She also notes that it is important to support more women’s initiative in 3D printing and STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math) in general if as a society we hope to see more women working in these technical fields. Without addressing all these issues, it would be near impossible to increase the presence of women in the industry in any truly meaningful way.