this is sean's first day experimenting with his ilimb. he has a few kinks to work out before he holdshis cup of coffee. you want your kid to be perfect and nothingto go wrong, you know it is what it is. if we had not had the insurance then there'sno way sean would've had a prosthesis. we were very excited about it.
3d printing impact on manufacturing, then it seemed to be more disappointing each time he tried to use it. i always just found them frustrating. when i first met lyman, i thought it was reallycool that he was actually trying to help and make a difference.
so i said, sean, you know, if you had a handthat was really like a hand, would it be more functional, would you try it? and he said, yeah, i'll try it. i'm lyman connor. by day i'm a software engineer at generalelectric and after hours i work in my lab creating bionic prosthesis. i was captivated by the cost of $50,000 fora prosthetic hand. the device does not need to be that expensive. who is to tell someone that you can't geta leg or an arm?
you're already adding insult to injury. my goal was design something that has allthe same capabilities as the $50,000 hands at a fraction of the price. sean o'connor, he was my sounding board for anythingtechnological or structurally that i wanted to do with the hand. it's very exciting to, like, be a part ofsomething that's actually trying to advance current prosthetics because not a wholelot has changed. eduardo came into the project to modify andperfect all the cosmetics. when i first started working with him, hehad a rough version of what his vision was.
what i ended up doing was separating all thosedifferent components and then in the future, we're able change the dimensions and make a completelydifferent version for every specific patient. we're at the stage of development with theprosthesis where we felt like, okay we have product. after measuring the patient, we're able todesign the size of the hand that we want, click print and within 24 hours, start assembling. i don't need$70,000 pieces of equipment. this is everything that i need.
the really cool thing about the micro factory scenario is that anyone that has a passion and a vision to create a product can get startedwith just one printer, and then once you're ready to scale up, start using multiple printers. the initial concept was to help one person,and sean, through his willingness to help has opened up the door for us to support andhelp people all over the world. now that we've fitted our first patient successfully,we're able to replicate this process for any other patient that needs one. compared to my first hand, this one, i canalready tell is a lot more comfortable, it's lighter.
as we improve it, it can only get better. just because you may want a prosthetic handdoesn't mean that you'll qualify for it
even if your insurance will pay. i want to make something affordable and changethe whole demographics of who can afford these hands. the whole idea is to go global and make apositive impact.
