36Kr Exclusive Interview | Head of Anker Innovations' eufy Make: After a Crowdfunding Campaign Exceeding $40 Million, Still Seeking Niches in the Red Ocean

Author | Zhang Ziyi

Editor | Yuan Silai

It was the night when a successful story worth $50 million was born.

Cheney Xie, the head of R & D at eufy Make, still remembers the dopamine rush of ecstasy. It was 10 p.m. on April 29, 2025, when the eufy Make UV Printer E1 went live on the crowdfunding platform.

It took less than a minute to reach the first $1 million. "It felt like coins were pouring in, and the amount just kept soaring," said someone.

No one slept that night. Until four or five o'clock in the morning, the team members were still constantly updating the real - time screenshots of the crowdfunding amount.

To this day, the eufy Make E1 still holds the record for the highest - funded project in Kickstarter history with a crowdfunding amount of $46.7 million.

Nearly a year has passed since the launch of the eufy Make E1. The product has been almost fully delivered overseas, and it has also officially gone on sale in the domestic market.

For both Anker Innovations and eufy Make, successful mass production and delivery are of great milestone significance. After all, the E1 is the world's first consumer - grade UV printer. Producing it requires new experience and also involves complex industrial chain integration.

The market had little confidence in the smooth launch of this product. Before developing the eufy Make E1, Anker had developed 3D printers. The earliest generation of 3D printers also set a crowdfunding record, but ultimately faced difficulties in mass production and delivery and didn't achieve success.

To avoid the mass - production problems of the early 3D printers, this time, the eufy Make project team held nearly 200 discussion meetings. They worked on the product during the day and reviewed the modules at night, aiming to ensure that every part was in the best - possible architecture. When the team argued the most fiercely, Cheney Xie remembered that the doorknob of the meeting room was even broken.

Even so, during the mass production of tens of thousands of units, the tolerance of the mold caused a liquid - leakage problem. Under the pressure of shipping, the engineers slept in the factory for a month to troubleshoot the problem. Eventually, they decided to re - mold, re - produce, and replace all the affected parts.

They also delved into the upstream of the industry for the first time. Take UV ink as an example. Although more than 80% of the world's UV ink is produced in China, it is mainly for the industrial field. No one knew how to make consumer - grade UV ink. eufy Make had to work with the industrial chain. They had to achieve dust - free filling, environmental protection certification, and chip control, etc. The cost also kept rising. The price of 100ml of UV ink is $42.99. The expensive ink has become one of the frequently discussed issues among users.

This was a difficulty that was not considered when designing the UV printer initially. Cheney Xie said that at every stage of the project, he kept asking himself if he had made the right choice and if there was room for improvement. Even after the successful delivery, Cheney Xie still said that this generation of the product was not perfect enough and there were still a lot of innovation opportunities.

They have also become the leaders in the industry. 36Kr learned that many companies, including startups, are now researching and developing UV - related hardware products.

At this point, we had a chat with Cheney Xie to find out what the team had experienced behind this star product and how Anker implemented and practiced.

01 Start Over Even After Molding

Hard Krypton: I'd like to trace back to a question. You mentioned that you started visiting factories in 2023. Were you already planning to enter the UV printer market at that time?

Cheney Xie: At that time, we conducted in - depth interviews with more than 50 Makers and a questionnaire survey of more than 2,000 Makers. We found that what users really needed was a "creative tool".

Any work has three dimensions: "shape, color, and texture". FDM only solves the shape but not the color and texture. Laser engraving solves cutting and part of the surface texture but also lacks color. The UV printing technology has been around in the industrial world for decades. It can solve the color problem and can create based on existing items, with extremely wide commercial application scenarios.

There was a gap in the market at that time. We spent more than half a year on technical pre - research. By the end of 2023, we decided to adjust our strategy, abandon the FDM market, and fully focus on the UV printer market.

Hard Krypton: When demonstrating this product at the end of 2023, it was a completely new product category, and you didn't have similar experience or genes in the past. What was the most difficult point to convince the boss?

Cheney Xie: The resistance during the presentation in 2023 was not as great as expected. We have a clear criterion for deciding whether to launch a product: Can this product be truly globally leading in a certain dimension - either creating something that no one has ever done before or outperforming others in the most important user experience indicators? If we can't clarify this, it usually means that we haven't thought the matter through or the direction is not worth betting on.

At that time, we presented two opportunities. Later, the boss asked us to choose one and gave us three more months for demonstration. After the final round of demonstration, we chose UV because the insights showed that users had a very high degree of preference for this concept.

Hard Krypton: UV printing was originally an industrial - grade product. During the technical pre - research stage, did you find any aspects that were extremely challenging or even impossible to achieve?

Cheney Xie: Yes. For example, the cost of the inkjet system. Industrial equipment costs hundreds of thousands of yuan per unit, and we needed to reduce the cost to one - tenth. At that time, we asked the solution provider. A nozzle control board card was sold for 40,000 yuan. I asked if it could be cheaper in large quantities. They said the cheapest was 4,000 yuan. We couldn't afford 4,000 yuan either.

Later, we disassembled it and found that the material cost of the board card itself was actually only 400 yuan. The high cost was due to R & D. The industrial solution provider sells a few thousand pieces a year and has to support more than 100 R & D staff, so all the costs are shared.

Since we judged that the material cost was actually only 400 yuan, we decided to develop it ourselves. As long as we break through the self - developed technology, the cost will come down. Although no one had done it before and we were a bit nervous, the logic was sound.

Hard Krypton: What exactly does this control board card do?

Cheney Xie: It controls the inkjet drive, inkjet algorithm, etc. of the entire nozzle.

Hard Krypton: When you were developing this product, you found that industrial equipment was very specialized in this area, including flatbed machines, rotary machines, crystal label machines, and roll - to - roll machines. How did you integrate them?

Cheney Xie: The clear division of labor in the industry is for large - scale business, but our users are for long - tail creation. We had to compress the functions of these four machines into one and reduce the volume to one - tenth of the industrial machine.

The early architecture was overturned three times. At first, we made a single - swivel arm, but the accuracy couldn't meet the requirement of 30 microns. Later, we borrowed the gantry structure of 3D printing and pioneered a double - Y - axis staggered design, making the volume very flat. With this architecture, various platform boards can be easily replaced. Just lock a rotating body accessory. To ensure stability, we used a 1,250 - ton integrated die - casting process for the first time to cast the X - axis frame, ensuring stability during movement.

Hard Krypton: How many times did you probably have to start over with this architecture?

Cheney Xie: Three times.

Hard Krypton: The first three times should not have reached the molding stage, right? Did you have to start over again after molding?

Cheney Xie: Yes, once, when working on the "three - dimensional texture".

It was in the second half of 2024, and the project had already been molded. We saw "texture paintings" at an exhibition, which was very inspiring. The texture paintings are piled up layer by layer, which can simulate various textures, and the effect is amazing. Later, we went to Dafencun, printed some samples of texture paintings, and talked to users. They were very excited. We decided that even if the project was postponed and we had to re - mold, we would make the three - dimensional texture the biggest innovation point of the product.

Hard Krypton: This sounds difficult. What is the most core difficulty for you in this three - dimensional texture?

Cheney Xie: The difficulty lies in the entire chain. First, we need a model. Ordinary consumers don't know how to turn a picture into a three - dimensional model. So at the software level, we need to use a large - language model for training. The algorithms for oil paintings, reliefs, human faces, and landscapes are all different and need to be trained separately.

Then there is the stacking algorithm. If the accuracy is not enough or a certain hole is blocked, the stacked part will become a pit. We studied for more than a year to figure it out. Although no one on the team had experience in inkjet printing, we had the algorithm team and experience in hardware architecture, sensors, and AI detection accumulated from 3D printing, so we could handle it.

Hard Krypton: The problems in the hardware and software aspects and innovation points may have been solved, but is the final mass - production stage a brand - new challenge?

Cheney Xie: Mass production is indeed extremely challenging. No one has ever produced tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of UV printers. The industrial - grade products sell a maximum of 1,000 units a year. The crowdfunding result far exceeded expectations. We originally planned to raise $10 million, but we ended up raising more than $40 million. The pressure was very high.

Hard Krypton: What difficulties will there be in delivery? The 3D printers of AnkerMake had problems in delivery before, and 3D printing is relatively mature. What you are doing now with UV printing has no precedent at all.

Cheney Xie: The core is to re - define. We placed 100 machines in the factory and conducted pressure tests every day. We used several tons of ink, which cost a lot of money. To ensure the quality of product delivery, our engineers chose to stay in the factory and work with the die - casting factory to solve the engineering problems of integrated die - casting.

Hard Krypton: Did you learn from the lessons of making 3D printers before?

Cheney Xie: Of course. This time, we did a lot of work in the early - stage simulation and architecture demonstration. The team conducted experiments during the day and held review meetings at night. There were more than 200 such review meetings. We checked the best architecture module by module.

Hard Krypton: In the whole process, in which stage do you remember the most intense conflict occurring?

Cheney Xie: Actually, there were many. The team argued very fiercely (laughs).

For example, the product manager insisted that the weight should not exceed 20 kilograms for fear that users couldn't lift it, so they had to reduce the weight of each part. Some people would ask, "Is this extra 0.5 millimeters really that important? Will users not buy our product because of the extra 0.5 millimeters?"

But this is the spirit of making a product. If you relax a little here, you will be more lenient in many other places that you can't see. You have to calculate and pay attention to every detail. This kind of running - in lasted for a year and a half and was very exhausting.

Hard Krypton: Regarding the supply chain, especially the nozzles mentioned earlier, many are provided by Japanese manufacturers, and the prices are extremely high. Have you worried about the supply stability or bargaining power? How did you handle this?

Cheney Xie: Indeed, except for the nozzles, we have independent control over other technologies. China has not made a breakthrough in nozzle technology for decades. We can only choose to work with factories and suppliers to solve a large number of engineering problems. In fact, we have no other choice. We also hope to promote the localization of nozzles.

Hard Krypton: Currently, you have a stable supply source. But as EufyMake becomes successful, competitors (such as xTool, Tuozhu, etc.) are following up. Since the nozzles are not currently made in China, will there be a risk in the supply end when the competition becomes fierce?

Cheney Xie: It's hard to say. Just like mobile phone chips, in - depth cooperation can ensure priority access to goods. I think competition is inevitable, but in the end, it's a process of mutual win - win.

02 New Problems with a New Product Category

Hard Krypton: There is a problem that we didn't realize. Consumers think the ink of EufyMake is very expensive. Why is that?

Cheney Xie: Actually, the UV printing industry has been around for decades, and it was mainly in the industrial field in the past. Currently, more than 80% of the world's UV ink is basically produced in China.

We thought it was very simple at the beginning: Since the ink is produced in China, why not just find a supplier to purchase it? But later we found that the industrial standards and consumer - grade standards are completely different. Industrial machines cost hundreds of thousands of yuan each and are used in factories, while what we are making is for home use, and the scenario has completely changed.

Household - grade ink must be safe and environmentally friendly first. We consulted top - level certification institutions like UL to understand what the top - level safety and environmental - protection standards are. We need to follow the strictest standard, called GREENGUARD Gold.

We need to ensure that after printing, children can directly touch the printed items. Although the product category is currently limited and we can't reach food - grade safety, at least we need to ensure that it's safe for children to touch. This is the first standard we set.

The second is quality. We want to achieve an amazing effect, so the printing quality must meet the industrial - grade standard. At that time, we set a standard that the color - difference standard ΔΕ must be less than 6. Once it exceeds this value, the naked eye can clearly see the color - level difference, and it will be unqualified.

Another problem is the nozzle - clogging issue. If the nozzle of an industrial machine is clogged, professional workers can use a syringe to clean the nozzle. But in fact, our consumers won't clean it with a syringe by themselves. So we have high - level requirements for the ink - quality control and impurity filtration. From the large - scale filtration to the filling process, the ink must be handled in a 10,000 - class dust - free environment. Industrial ink doesn't do this in order to pursue large - scale production and low cost. But once we re - define the consumer - grade standard, the cost naturally goes up.

Finally, for safety reasons, we made the ink cartridges closed. Since the ink is corrosive before curing and long - term skin contact may cause allergies, we must reduce users' contact with the ink. Moreover, we added a chip and a QR code to the ink cartridge to track it from the production source, and users will even be reminded when the ink is about to expire.

Many users didn't understand these things at the beginning. They thought that the industrial ink was so cheap, so why was ours so expensive? We heard these voices, and now we are looking for new solutions while ensuring safety and high quality.

Hard Krypton: I heard that the problem of nozzle clogging is common in UV printers. So is your solution to use this box - type system to lock the ink system?

Cheney Xie: The closed - type system is one of the measures, but the nozzle - clogging problem has not been completely solved in the entire inkjet - printing industry for decades. In 2023, when we visited factories and studios, the professionals told us that they were most afraid of leaving the machines unattended during the Spring Festival, and when they came back, the nozzles worth tens of thousands of yuan would be useless.

We want ordinary users to use the product continuously, so we must solve this problem. So we designed the Jet Clean™ automatic maintenance system. When you don't use the printer, it will automatically