UK’s first FabLab planned for Manchester

Professor Neil Gershenfeld (pictured), director of The Center for Bits and Atoms, Massachusets Institute of Technology (MIT) and founder of FabLab, will share his pioneering ideas and experiences in bringing technology to the people when he addresses the stakeholder event at The Manufacturing Institute in Manchester. FabLabs are fully-fitted digital fabrication workshops that give everyone in the community – from small children through to inventors and businesses – the capability to turn their ideas into reality. There are 35 FabLabs worldwide – located in inner city and Boston and rural India and from the northern extremity of Norway to African villages. Each is connected by a global communications network, enabling the sharing of ideas, designs and knowledge. Shepherds in Norway have used their FabLab to create mobile phones to track sheep, while children in Ghana are making circuit boards for the sheer sense of achievement. In Afghanistan, people are fashioning customised prosthetic limbs, while in South Africa a government and business backed project is creating simple internet connected computers that hook up to televisions and cost just ten dollars each. The Manchester FabLab project is being driven by the Manufacturing Institute in partnership with Manchester City Council via the Innovation Investment Fund. Together, they are planning to open a digital fabrication centre, and are working in conjunction with urban regeneration company, New East Manchester Ltd to look at potential sites in east Manchester. “This is a grass roots, community project that gives everybody the tools to tap into their powers of invention”, said Julie Madigan, chief executive of the Manufacturing Institute. “By empowering individuals, developing skills, furthering innovation, educating children and prototyping new product ideas from business, a FabLab can stimulate the economy and benefit many different parts of the community. Said Eddie Smith, Chief Executive of New East Manchester: “The prospect of Manchester getting a FabLab is very exciting and would be yet another first for the City. Although this project is still in the early stages, it has the potential to form a key part of our regeneration programme for east Manchester and we would welcome the opportunity to bring it to the area. The FabLab will be a catalyst for positive change, bringing together young and old, and businesses and individuals – in the shared aim of translating their ideas and concepts into something real.” Born from an outreach project by MIT in inner-city Boston, FabLabs have exploded around the world – reversing the top down approach to technological advancement by empowering everyone to invent. Although typical FabLabs have a technically skilled staff, much of the learning and teaching comes from other users and by communicating with people in other FabLabs internationally. The philosophy is open source, whereby people use the centre for free in return for sharing full information with the global community. Businesses can opt to protect their product development ideas by paying to use the service.