Almost every 3D printer moves its printhead with belts and pulleys, an affordable solution that comes with certain limits. The belt stretches, vibrates, and loses rigidity over time. For years, the industry has had a faster and more precise alternative in linear motors, but their price has kept them out of reach for many machine builders. Dutch startup Tesseract Technologies wants to change that with a linear motor developed from the ground up, from hardware to firmware, which the company says is two to five times more cost-effective than other products with similar performance.
The project began as the thesis of its founder, Timothy Kramer, and is already running on actual machines such as the FELIX Pro XXL from FELIXprinters. With a commercial launch planned for the first quarter of 2027, we spoke with the founder to understand what changes when you remove the belt, how closed-loop control continuously corrects the printhead’s position, and why multiple toolheads working simultaneously on the same axis could lead to entirely new machines. Don’t miss it!
Timothy Kramer, founder of Tesseract, during his presentation at Formnext 2025. The startup was a finalist for the Rookie Award.
3DN: Could you introduce yourself and tell us what led you to found Tesseract Technologies?
My name is Timothy Kramer, and I’m the founder of Tesseract Technologies. As a student in the 2010s, I was fascinated by 3D printing. Being able to design something on a computer and then watch the part being manufactured right in front of you felt very empowering. What bothered me, however, was the print speed.
In 2017, I discovered the linear motor: faster and more precise, with constant error correction and very little maintenance. Given those advantages, I wondered why additive manufacturing hadn’t yet adopted this technology. The reason turned out to be cost, driven by the high-end industrial market. So, for my thesis, I set myself the challenge of developing an affordable version of the linear motor. I built a working prototype from scratch that, by 2020, was already outperforming the motion systems in 3D printers. We haven’t stopped developing it since.
3DN: What is Tesseract’s mission?
Our mission is to make linear motor technology accessible to a much broader range of machine builders and applications. High-performance motion should not be limited to the few applications that can justify an expensive, high-end system.
We bridge the gap between conventional drives, such as stepper motors, and premium industrial linear motors. We deliver the speed, precision, reliability and closed-loop control that modern machines need, at a cost that makes sense for each application. This allows machine builders to create faster, more reliable machines without over-engineering their motion systems.
The FELIX Pro XXL from FELIXprinters, equipped with Tesseract’s linear motors
3DN: For those unfamiliar with the topic, what does a linear motor offer compared to the belts in a 3D printer?
In a belt-drive system, a motor drives a carriage to which it is connected by a belt. The belt behaves like a rubber band: it stretches during movement and vibrates. On the printed part, this shows up in three ways:
- faint ripples on the surface just after corners (an effect known as ringing),
- softened edges,
- small dimensional errors.
There are correction techniques, such as input shaping, that reduce these effects. However, they are limited in what they can do and come at the expense of other aspects, like corner rounding.
Belts also vary in stiffness over time and with temperature, so a machine that was tuned earlier may not behave the same way today. The problem gets worse with heavier printheads. A pellet extruder or a large gantry needs more force to move, and more force means more belt stretch.
A linear motor removes that elastic link altogether. The magnets are integrated into the axis and the coils sit in our carriage, so the carriage is driven directly, with nothing stretchy in between. The result is higher speed without losing detail and better repeatability. On top of that, performance stays consistent instead of degrading as belts age.
For machine builders, this means higher productivity and less maintenance. For print farms, it means more reliable operation and less downtime. The advantages grow with the size of the machine and the weight of the moving parts, which is exactly where belts start to limit what is possible.
3DN: Industrial linear motors are expensive. What did you have to rethink to make yours more affordable?
Compared to existing products with similar performance, we are currently two to five times more cost-effective.
We achieved this by developing every element of the linear motor from scratch: the motor hardware, control electronics, sensor technology and firmware. For the hardware, we have a database of over 15 million viable motor models to which we apply our optimization process. Add to that smart design choices and the use of widely available materials and electronics. The result is a cost-effective platform that we can keep innovating on and that complies with industrial standards and regulations.
The coil units (forcers) and linear encoder of Tesseract’s system.
3DN: Who is this technology for, and what kind of machines can be built with it that were difficult or too expensive to build before?
Linear motors offer advantages in speed, precision, repeatability, reliability, and maintenance. But their value goes beyond simply making large machines move faster.
Since our system operates in a closed loop, the position of each carriage is continuously measured and corrected. If the printhead is bumped or moved by hand during a print, it simply returns to where it should be. On most printers today, that same disturbance causes the machine to keep printing at an offset, and the part ends up being scrapped. In a production environment, this translates into greater process reliability, better repeatability, and a lower risk of losing parts due to positioning errors.
The advantages are particularly noticeable in large machines. There, long belts, moving masses, and high forces quickly become limiting factors. But they also matter in smaller machines, wherever precision, repeatability, or belt wear are important considerations. Removing the belt eliminates one of the variables that change over the course of a machine’s service life.
The bigger shift lies in what it allows designers to do. Multiple carriages can move independently on the same axis. This means several toolheads or gantries can work on the same part at the same time, rather than a single printhead simply moving faster. And since there are no belts, pulleys or other transmission components to route through the machine, motion can be integrated into places where a conventional setup would be impractical. That is where it stops being a faster belt drive and becomes a different way of designing machines.
3DN: Could you share a specific example from your pilot projects and what you learned from it?
One of our main development partners is FELIXprinters, which is also based in the Netherlands. At Formnext 2025 in Frankfurt, we showcased their FELIX Pro XXL machine running on our linear motors, and they will be back at Formnext 2026 with the latest version. The axes measure approximately 1.5 x 1.7 m, which gives a build area of around 1 x 1.5 m. The machine features two independent toolheads (IDEX).
We learned a lot about what it takes to develop these motors to specific requirements. We also learned how to use our electronics to analyze every aspect of the motor while ensuring accurate positioning. The most important lesson, however, was about the machine surrounding the motor. Integrating these motors requires a mechanically sound machine, and that is now one of the first topics we discuss with every new partner.
CAD model of a multi-gantry machine.
3DN: What are the long-term goals or developments you are most excited about at Tesseract?
Tesseract is preparing to enter a strategic partnership with an experienced machine-building and manufacturing company, and together we expect to bring our technology to market in the first quarter of 2027. We will provide the linear motor technology and control systems, while our partner will contribute industrialization and series production.
Further out, the development I am most excited about is simultaneous multi-toolhead motion. Because multiple carriages can run independently on a single axis, the technology opens the door to machine architectures where several tools work at once. That is a reason to design entirely new machines, not just to improve existing ones.
3DN: Any final thoughts for our readers?
We remain open to collaborating with other companies in the industry, especially slicing software experts, to make simultaneous multi-toolhead printing a reality.
To learn more about Tesseract Technologies, visit their website HERE.
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*All Photo Credits: Tessaract Technologies