Are you a researcher wanting to exploit your results and have you considered them as a spin-off, patent or licence? Are you a start-up looking to bring a new idea or process to market? Have you been working hard on developing new ground-breaking technologies and disruptive services, but when it comes to exploiting them, you are unsure how to proceed?

Our aim is to help today's researchers create tomorrow's enterprises and we will help you.

About this workshop

Take part in the seventh in a series of Cambridge MERLIN workshops dedicated to LEAN HARDWARE.

We’re delighted to confirm Pete Lomas, Co-Creator & Trustee of Raspberry Pi and Director of Engineering at Norcott Technologies, as our guest speaker.

This interactive workshop will take you through the phases of development of an electronic product from concept through to manufacture. Using the iconic Raspberry Pi’s development journey to provide a context Pete will discuss, the “what if” mindset, getting to your minimum viable product and the challenges for manufacture.

Coupled with this he will also briefly look at how Raspberry Pi created a voice, a viral marketing campaign and a community around the mission the educate and the importance of brand identity.

About the Speaker

Pete Lomas

Pete Lomas holds a B.Sc. and M.Sc. in computer science from the University of Manchester. His passion for teaching and sharing ideas led him to take up a lecturing post at Manchester. During this time he became heavily involved in the ‘hobby computer’ movement and set up a local computer club that engaged the local community in this new and exciting field.

In 1986 the lure of industry became too great and he set up an electronics design consultancy. In 1997 he sold the company and established Norcott Technologies, today a leading UK provider of electronic design and manufacturing services serving a wide range of customers ranging from innovators and early stage businesses through to blue chip multinational companies and academic research institutions.

Within Norcott he serves as Director of Engineering and is heavily involved at the engineering “coal face”. He has led on designs as diverse as engine management units, high performance cryptographic engines, x-ray scanning systems and “internet edge” devices.

In 2008 his passion for education resurfaced. With a group of like- minded individuals based in Cambridge they established the Raspberry Pi Foundation. As a UK registered charity it has a keen focus on putting creativity, experimentation and fun into the teaching of digital making, primarily through the use of the low cost Raspberry Pi Linux computer.

Pete was responsible for the design and manufacturing support for the first three million devices including the transfer of operations back to the UK at Sony Pencoed. Over a period of seven years the Raspberry Pi computer has gone from being a small scale educational project to a worldwide phenomenon with sales of over 20 Million units and becoming the third best-selling computing platform behind the Apple Mac and the ubiquitous ‘86 based PC .

Within Raspberry Pi, Pete has now taken up a role as a foundation trustee focusing on helping to bring computer science and engineering centre stage in young people’s search for a fulfilling career through mainstream and ad hoc educational opportunities.

In 2017 Pete was a co-recipient the prestigious MacRobert Award and became a fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 2018.

Today in addition to his other roles he is president of the Institute of Engineering Designers promoting excellence in design across the spectrum of engineering disciplines.

About MERLIN project

MERLIN (Methodologies for Researcher Led Innovations) will support market-oriented researchers, SMEs and start-ups across Europe, to consider the full potential of their research and to shape ideas and outputs into innovations to be ready for market validation and commercialisation, by using modern needs-first, market-led methodologies.

MERLIN offers a range of dynamic workshops and relevant training to guide researchers and businesses on the journey to commercialisation. The programme, consisting on 8 workshops, will equip participants with knowledge, skills and network to generate market-led business models to unlock potential and accelerate this journey. MERLIN will organize 2 meetups with potential partners, customers and investors by the end of each year, to help participants grow. Moreover, selected participants will be invited to participate in Startup Europe events.

MERLIN has been funded in the context of the Innovation Radar initiative of the European Commission, under the Digital Single Market strategy.