Photocentric JENI 3D Prints Small Parts at Injection-Molding Volumes

A Tower That Prints Like a Factory

Photocentric's JENI does not look like a traditional 3D printer. It is a tall tower, glowing red from within, built from modular sections that stack like server racks. Add a module and it grows. Reconfigure a node and it changes process. The company says a single installation can produce hundreds of thousands of parts per day, and in some cases more than a million.

The system pairs high-resolution LCD resin printing with robotic post-processing. A digital file sent to JENI carries both print instructions and the full wash-and-cure sequence. The platform monitors every node, assigns jobs to the next free machine that matches the requirements, and a gantry moves the print platform into position. Because each job carries its own parameters, JENI can run different geometries and post-processing sequences in the same batch without manual intervention.

What It Actually Prints

Photocentric is not chasing aerospace brackets or rocket nozzles. JENI is aimed at the small plastic parts the world runs on: standoff spacers, cable grommets, clips, connectors, caps, and handles. A single module can produce 238,000 spacers per day at less than $0.02 each. Cable grommets cost roughly $0.07 to print in-house compared to $0.34 purchased externally. Those margins explain why the company calls it injection molding without tooling.

Layer thickness adjusts per job, from 25 or 50 microns up to 250 microns for faster throughput. The build envelope is currently 224 x 127 x 57 mm, set by the 10-inch screen. Photocentric focused on that size because parts produced in the millions tend to be small. Complex geometries cost no more to produce than simple ones of the same volume: no draft angles, no split lines, no ejector pin marks.

Materials and Sustainability

Photocentric formulates its own photopolymers, and a growing share of the raw material comes from bio-waste, food waste, and agricultural residues rather than petrochemicals. The company cites its Durable DL902 Plant-Based resin as an example, with 52% bio-based content and mechanical properties it compares to ABS-like engineering materials.

JENI traces its origins to the Covid-19 pandemic, when Photocentric ran 52 LC Magna printers that produced more than a million face shields per month. That run exposed the labor bottlenecks the new system is designed to eliminate. Paul Holt, Photocentric's Managing Director, named the project after the Spinning Jenny, the original industrial revolution machine that turned manual craft into scalable production.