AbstractThe always smooth landscape of optics and photonics is getting reawakened by new additive manufacturing techniques. Two visionary entrepreneurs give their opinion on the new way of making functional optics and how digital computing will extend the possibilities for all optical products and markets. Prof. Jyrki Saarinen, based at the University of Eastern Finland, UEF, is the founder of Heptagon and Executive Director of the European Optical Society, and Richard van de Vrie, entrepreneur in the lighting industry and founder of Luxexcel, inventor of optical 3D printing, offering a new service for the production of functional optics in the additive way. How do they envision the role of 3D printing in the optical market?