The end of the summer marks the return to school and a time to digest our favorite summer publication: the Gartner Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies Chart. Every year I feel a bit confused about this graph. Folks in B2B sectors swear by it and have pointed out that in the last two years the internet of things reached… Continue reading Ten years of the internet of things through the eyes of Gartner
Category: Innovation & business
Making ourselves happy
I just got off recording a podcast which was focused on AI and sci-fi. Not my favorite topics. Reminded me of a moment in the excellent Déclin de l’Empire Américain (1986). Ce qui veut dire qu’un mariage réussi n’a rien à voir avec le bonheur personnel de deux individus mariés ensemble. À la limite, la question… Continue reading Making ourselves happy
How to get people to make things for you
We’re a week away from the deadline for the Smart Oxford Challenge and I was asked if this was a hackathon. That expression and the format it has come to represent gives me the heeby-jeebies so I wanted to share why, and what makes the Challenge different. This is coming from ten years of organising events… Continue reading How to get people to make things for you
#yearnotes
It’s been a hell of a year, peppered with great work with many clients as our consulting activities ramped up. This year we’ve done many things: – Helped finalise the outreach activities of Eyehub, a government funded internet of things demonstrator project – Wrote a report (pdf) on what connected products businesses needed in the UK for… Continue reading #yearnotes
Making & the corporate office
(This was originally written for and published in last month’s in Andrew Sleigh’s beautiful zine Hot Glue) I’ve worked for all sorts of businesses: large, medium and small and they all share a common aspiration: to be more like start-ups. You can’t swing a cat without taking part in a meeting where organisations wonder how… Continue reading Making & the corporate office
The cost and time to make things
So last week I launched sales for a limited edition of the Good Night Lamp. This is both an exercise in pig-headedness and a suicidal financial exercise. What prompted this? Next year will mark the 10th anniversary of this idea. There’s only so much time you can spend trying to turn lights on and off, but… Continue reading The cost and time to make things
Boosting the internet of things in the UK
View IOT companies (UK & Europe) in a larger map I’ve been putting a map together of internet of things startups in the UK & Europe since May 2012. It’s not that I don’t care about the rest of the world, but as I’ve written about before, there is a real opportunity for the UK… Continue reading Boosting the internet of things in the UK
Berg (2005-2014)
This has been a strange day, mostly because some of my friends who have run a really great studio have decided to shut it down, 483 weeks in. I met them when we were still students, Jack‘s class came to visit mine in Ivrea in April 2005. The year after he was to design Availabot and… Continue reading Berg (2005-2014)
Crowdfunding a hardware project: Tips & Tricks
I’ve been getting a lot of requests for coffees from startups who want to hear about crowd funding and the lessons I learnt running a campaign for the Good Night Lamp back in early 2013. I thought I’d capture what I’d say to them here and share it to a wider audience:) 1. What are… Continue reading Crowdfunding a hardware project: Tips & Tricks
Introducing #iotangels
Funding the Internet of Things in the UK from Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino There are many reasons why the UK is a great space for internet of things startups: access to the creative industries, manufacturing, advertising, technologists. Funding isn’t one of them sadly as I highlighed in a talk at a Policy Connect event last week at… Continue reading Introducing #iotangels