Bre Pettis (born c. 1972/1973)[1] is an American entrepreneur, video blogger and creative artist. Pettis is best known as the co-founder and former CEO of MakerBot Industries, a 3D printer company now owned by Stratasys.[3]
Bre Pettis | |
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Born | c. 1972 or 1973 (age 51–52)[1] |
Education | Evergreen State College (BA)[2] Pacific Oaks College (Education, teaching certificate) |
Known for | co-founder and former CEO of MakerBot Industries |
Pettis was raised in Ithaca, New York, a childhood spent climbing trees and playing in the woods independent and self-reliant.[4] At the age of 13 he moved to the Seattle area, where he later graduated from Bellevue High School.[5] Pettis is a 1995 graduate of The Evergreen State College,[6][7] where he studied psychology, mythology and performing arts.[8][9]
After college, Pettis worked as floor runner and camera assistant on feature films in Prague and as an assistant at Jim Henson's Creature Shop in London.[10] He then attended Pacific Oaks College and graduated with a teaching certificate.[7] He worked as a teacher for the Seattle Public Schools from 1999 through 2006.[11]
After graduating and working on various films in Europe, Pettis moved to London and began working at Jim Henson’s Creature Shop and making super-custom animatronics, or high-performance robots. Pettis learned prototyping here, as well as building one-of-a-kind things from scratch, allowing him to eventually be paid for his work.[4]
He is also known for DIY video podcasts for MAKE,[12] and for the History Hacker pilot on the History Channel.[13] He is one of the founders of the Brooklyn-based hacker space NYC Resistor.[14]
Pettis is a co-founder and former CEO[3] of MakerBot Industries, a company that produces 3D printers[12] now owned by Stratasys. Besides being a TV host and Video Podcast producer, he's created new media for Etsy.com, hosted Make: Magazine's Weekend Projects podcast, and has been a schoolteacher, artist, and puppeteer. He was the artist-in-residence of art group monochrom at Museumsquartier Vienna in 2007.[15][16]
Pettis was featured in the documentary film Print the Legend.[17]
He left Makerbot in 2014.[18]
In June 2017, Pettis acquired start-up Other Machine Co. — now called Bantam Tools — from its founder and CEO, Danielle Applestone.[19] In November 2019, Bantam Tools moved their facilities to Peekskill, NY.[20] In January 2024, Bantam Tools announced that it had acquired Evil Mad Scientist,[21] known for the AxiDraw, a computer-controlled drawing and handwriting machine.
The group that created the 3-D MakerBot printer — Mr. Pettis, 38, Mr. Smith, 27, and Mr. Mayer, 35