Making

MIT’s New Makerspace Plans to Facilitate International Collaborations

Funded by the Victor and William Fung Foundation, the makerspace will provide local resources and global connections for the MIT community.

• By Sri Ravipati
• 06/01/16

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced the creation of a new makerspace that will facilitate collaborations between MIT and the global community.

The Victor and William Fung Foundation funded the project to connect MIT’s innovation ecosystem to the world, creating a physical location for the MIT community to collaborate physically or virtually with the Innovation Node in Hong Kong.

“Supporting the construction of makerspaces at MIT will contribute to pushing the frontier of innovation by more rapidly moving ideas from laboratory to market,” said Victor Fung at the signing ceremony for the new initiative. “We look forward to bringing to life innovative services and products as a result of enhanced collaboration between MIT’s makerspaces in the U.S. and Hong Kong.”

Although the campus already has an abundance of makerspaces (more than 120,000 square feet) offering 3D printing, CNC milling, laser cutting and other technologies, many of these facilities are heavily oversubscribed, according to information from MIT. The proposed makerspace will “serve to vastly increase MIT students’ access to the resources they require to iterate and drive ideas toward realization and adoption by the marketplace.”