Mike Griffin doesn’t do hype cycles. He’s a UK-based developer with decades of experience working across EU and UK innovation and research programs. He’s spent enough time in the ecosystem to recognise the difference between rules that enable trust and scale and those that create confusion.
As the founder of ACT member company MyPrintPod, Mike sits at the intersection of digital infrastructure and real-world impact, where AI systems can help make operations smarter and cleaner, but only if startups, scaleups, and tech small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can build on predictable foundations. These include fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory (FRAND) SEP licensing practices, workable compliance for AI regulation, and frameworks that don’t turn innovation into a legal budgeting exercise.
In this Developer Community Spotlight, Mike shares what MyPrintPod is building, how AI and the internet of things (IoT) are helping translate sustainability goals into operational results, and why the investment case for small teams rises or falls on regulatory predictability, especially when technical standards and standard-essential patent (SEP) licensing set the price and pace of scaling.
Q&A with Mike Griffin
Q1: MyPrintPod started as a personal obsession with 3D printing, but it’s clearly grown into something much bigger than a hobby. What are you building now, and what was the point where you realised it could become a real solution for industry, not just a passion project?
Firstly, I blame my brother – he bought a 3D printer, and I got hooked on it, so it all started as a passion project. We have, however, now evolved to a solution where we can genuinely make guilt-free parts and components for industry with minimal impact on the environment, and not costing the earth. This is actually what folks want.
Q2: You’re pretty direct that the “green premium” era is over, and that sustainability is finally the sensible operational choice. Where are you seeing that translate into real-world decisions and results, in what customers are asking for and what they’re willing to prioritise?
Sustainability simply makes good business sense now – the days of paying a green premium are gone. Solar and wind are the cheapest ways to power your business; 3D printing is the most economical (and efficient); and recycled materials can be cheaper than brand-new feedstock.
From the customer’s perspective, there is more pressure than ever to be greener, and this is finally feeding into an appetite for sustainability.
Q3: You’ve talked about sustainability in a really practical way, down to materials, consistency, and quality control, not just big headline goals. How are you using AI and IoT to make that work more scalable at MyPrintPod, and what does it allow you to do now that would’ve been far harder five years ago?
AI is really important to us for our new material formulations. We have just won a UK Government project for using seaweed as a filler in nylon. We are building an AI model as part of the research to give us the optimum recipe for the strength parameters we need. As to IoT, we are developing Raspberry Pi-powered print pods that combine measurement and QA components to help maintain print quality for our customers. These days, you need to automate as much as you can.
Q4: Once you’re selling into industry, you’re not operating in isolation; you’re plugging into other systems and existing workflows. Where do integration and interoperability become make-or-break for you, and what’s the moment where you know ‘if this doesn’t connect cleanly, it doesn’t scale’?
This is a really interesting one. We are heavily invested in AI-based code generation. This means we can build a custom print environment easily (and we are doing that). But eventually you need to talk to somebody/something else – that’s where standards come in. No standards, no interoperability, and this is the bit that matters – the rest you pretty much have a shot at building yourself.
Q5: You mentioned that some standards-driven requirements you can engineer around, but others you simply can’t avoid. In practice, how does standard-essential patent (SEP) licensing change what you build, what you budget for, and how quickly you can move once you’re dealing with things like Bluetooth?
So far, we have engineered around a lot of standards, but some you simply can’t avoid (Bluetooth, for example, is a nightmare). As an SME, we need a really simple way to identify, access, and pay for the IP we need. Licensors would have much higher adoption and compliance rates if they actually tried to help us buy the stuff. They make it harder than it needs to be.
Q6: Beyond AI policy and the SEP licensing landscape, how much does regulatory predictability shape whether investors back teams like yours, and what does uncertainty actually do to the business case when you’re trying to plan ahead?
Doubt equals risk, and risk equals cost. It’s as simple as that. If regulations are not clear about what you are expected to comply with, then you need to manage it, and that means dollars spent. Similarly, all regulations have ups and downs; too much of the wrong sort, and again, costs go up, or growth is constrained. Poor growth potential simply turns off investment.
However, we all need rules, or the game can’t be played at all.
Q7: You also flagged that a huge share of UK green tech is delivered by small and medium-sized businesses, which makes the policy environment pretty consequential. Looking ahead, what does the future of sustainability actually demand, and what would it take for the UK to feel like a place where small teams can genuinely build that future at scale?
UK green tech represents an estimated $77 billion in economic activity and around 700,000 jobs across the UK. Most of it is delivered by small to medium-scale businesses (sub $1m turnover) – so it’s very important to the UK economy. There is a push-pull dynamic at the moment, both at the operational and policy levels. Some parts of the UK government are very pro-sustainability, and others seem to be pushing against. This confusion is creating market uncertainty. The government does have a plan – they need to push it as fast and as hard as they can.
Q8: You were recently quoted in the BBC’s reporting on UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and Innovate UK pausing or narrowing grants and backing fewer companies. For a company like yours, how do you explain the link between the policy-related barriers and access to capital, investor confidence, and your ability to scale?
Ideally, regulation should create a clear, appropriately constrained, and policed playing field for all, that reduces risks to people, the planet, and profit, whilst creating an ecosystem where growth can thrive. That’s actually really tricky.
Any part of this (poorly designed regulations, sloppy greenwashing compliance) can diminish growth. Luckily, the UK has a fantastic research and business support system in Innovate UK that we have used regularly, providing policy guidance to the government, showcasing best practices, and sponsoring high-risk development for industry. We worry, however, that this facility is under threat from impending budget cuts.
When I spoke with the BBC, I was clear that Innovate UK’s support was the moment MyPrintPod stopped being an idea and became a viable business. We use solar power and recycled plastic to 3D print industrial parts, and that early backing helped us prove the tech works and win partners. That’s why the changes genuinely worry me: for small companies, early-stage backing is the bridge to market. If support shifts toward bigger, later-stage winners, many practical, life-changing innovations won’t survive long enough to scale.
What does the UK need to signal that it’s serious about growing the sustainability sector? Simply execute on its promises. There are numerous pieces of legislation and funded commitments that are moving our society in the right direction, and sadly, short-term costs need to be expected during the changeover; however, once done, the cleaner and more sustainable society that will emerge will be more independent of external price shocks, fairer, and a much better place to live.