Back in the early 2000s, the Maker Movement took hold in California, based on the emergence of such do-it-yourself (DIY) tools as 3-D printers, and now sites such as SketchUp and Makerspaces have all the tools you need to make almost anything computer related. Thus entrepreneurs were able to build prototypes and design new products without the traditional huge prototyping cost.
The movement has long since spread across the country and across the globe, spawning innovative products such as the MakerBot Digitizer and all the things you can access from Thingiverse.com. Events for enthusiasts, formerly called Maker Faires, now stretch across the USA and into many other countries. They have also become great networking events for meeting other like-minded entrepreneurs.
I believe the Maker Movement and hardware startups with limited resources are made for each other. Here are some key positives from an entrepreneur perspective:
- Shorten the time and cost from idea to prototype. In today’s fast moving market, the basic product development cost and time are critical to survival. They come at the early stage while a startup has no revenue or valuation, so professional investors are hard to find. Low-cost design and fabrication tools are extremely valuable.
- Place to build skills and become familiar with new tools. Makerspaces, sometimes called hackerspaces, have sites and events, including tutorials, where people with common interests can meet, socialize and collaborate. With the new rapid prototyping tools, products can be physically built for analysis, rather than just conceptualized.
- Network with potential cofounders and strategic partners. Relationships are best built while working and learning together, rather than over drinks at a mixer or industry conference. There are already more than 1500 active hackerspaces worldwide, with info on Hackerspaces. Countless startup teams have already been spawned from these.
- Opportunity to meet investors and support organizations. Venture capitalists and investors are where the action is, to see first-hand what is possible, and who are the leaders. Makerspaces are becoming the new incubators and accelerators for startups, and support contacts, like lawyers and marketing groups, will be easy to find.
- Open your mind to new entrepreneurial opportunities. With low-cost digital design and fabrication tools, such as 3D printing and the ability to digitize almost any object, bold new innovations become apparent. Very young entrepreneurs get to “touch and feel” the results, and can experiment to their heart’s content. These ideas can grow quickly into real products.
- Meet the new consumer demand for customization. Customers today increasingly demand solutions that are customized just for them. Hobbyists and craftsmen have made custom solutions for a very long time, but companies have resisted this requirement to keep costs down. Maker tools are changing these economies of scale.
- Accelerate the trend to higher purpose startups. The new do-it-yourself capabilities and low entry costs mean that you don’t have be a Bill Gates to offer solutions that have an impact on society. The Maker Movement is already poised to transform learning in our schools, and offer low-cost solutions to solve environmental and third-world problems.
- Diversity breeds success. By collaborating with the Maker Movement, artistic entrepreneurs work with the technology freaks, and both benefit from other cultures around the world. New products emerge, as diverse as networked-art installations, Internet-of-Things innovations, and many other hybrid software-hardware solutions.
