It may seem like small potatoes, but Polish 3D printer manufacturer Zortrax has chalked a 5,000 unit order from Dell. This is the first I’ve heard of a mass order of home 3D-printing equipment and it means a real boon for the budding Olsztyn-based company.

“Dell kept in touch with us when we were still in the middle of our Kickstarter campaign. We weren’t in a position to make them a reasonable business offer at that time, since our production volume was very limited,” said Rafał Tomasiak, Zortrax CEO. “At that point in time the production was very tedious, every single printer was quality checked and tested by us. Business negotiations with Dell were stalled at some point and we focused on shipping the printers to our Kickstarter backers. Now the situation is much different, we are prepared for large quantity orders.”

Zortrax launched last May and is now shipping to happy Kickstarter backers. I’ve used the printer multiple times and was very impressed by the print quality and build. The company is poised to be a major player in the European market and, with this investment by Dell, potentially globally. The company said the the printers are headed toward Dell’s central and east Asia offices.

“Frankly speaking, we were surprised that any company, even a company like Dell, wants to place such an order! But after a while we realized how many printers we use in our own office… For a designer who prints a large number of prototypes it is much more useful to use 10 smaller printers on one desk, which operate simultaneously, rather than one with a larger build volume,” said Tomasiak.