Created at the IBM Cloud Garage in London, DesignSpark Marketplace looks to help makers, start-ups and small businesses promote, test and sell their inventions to an online community of more than 650,000 members..
Building on the success of its original platform, DesignSpark, RS has created a peer-to-peer marketplace. The work was carried out at the London IBM Cloud Garage, one of 12 physical hubs within IBM’s global Garage network.
Powered by IBM Cloud technologies such as the IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service, IBM Cloud Object Storage and data services such as MySQL and Elasticsearch, DesignSpark Marketplace connects makers with content to learn from their peers. It provides free CAD software to create new products and inventions such as Pi-Top, a laptop kit created to support STEM learning, and helps inventors to get their products to market. It does this by enabling makers to sell products which can be used by other inventors and big thinkers to further build innovation.
“The launch of DesignSpark Marketplace marks a step-change in a promising and innovative journey for both IBM and RS Components,” said Andy Stanford-Clark, IBM UKI CTO. “DesignSpark Marketplace is an exciting landmark, and a platform built in the IBM Cloud Garage to foster collaborative innovation to truly allow makers to kickstart their inventions and ideas.”
Deployed on the IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service, DesignSpark Marketplace utilises a broad suite of IBM Cloud services to integrate and run the new online community within RS’ existing digital presence, as well as augment it with third party components through an open and agile architecture.
Potential sellers can now list any product created, and users can register for free on the platform to buy and sell new creations, enabling makers to collaborate more creatively. The Marketplace supports projects related to electronics and 3-D printing – whether ‘add-on boards’ or kits to use with popular Single Board computers like Raspberry Pi or Arduino, or other standalone creative projects.
“We are focusing on solving one of the biggest challenges today for makers, engineers and entrepreneurs - getting new products and creations in front of potential customers.” explained Alex von Schirmeister, Chief Innovation Officer, RS Components. “In the long term, we look forward to innovation partnerships with many leading-edge technology partners and IBM in particular, expanding our work and combining our expertise and experience to drive even more compelling user experiences.”
