A maker startup in Chicago can take your paper airplane to new heights (and teach you a thing or two about electronics, motors and machines along the way).
Makexchange, founded by management consultant and mHUB member Joseph Greer, is a startup that creates maker kits designed with the non-engineer in mind. Greer is currently aiming to raise $25,000 to fund his first kit, called "Inventing With Electronics", along with parts to build a paper airplane launcher, built on Arduino, the open-source electronic prototyping platform that serves as a base to many electronics products.
While there are plenty of maker kits available to kids and adults alike, Greer found that many were geared toward those with experience in engineering. Boxes were often chock-full of wires, motors and pieces, allowing makers to tinker to their hearts content, but could be intimidating to someone new to the field.
"Nobody was addressing how anybody who’s nontechnical feels and what their experience is when they open that box," he said. "If the first thing they feel is fear and intimidation, they’re not going to have fun learning."
With that in mind, Greer designed the boxes to mimic a book you could pick off the shelf. The box opens to separate compartments for wiring and components, with the project base attached to the lid, which allows users to pack up a project and save their progress. Each kit has 245 parts and comes with instructions for creating a variety of simple electronic games, a musical keyboard, and other projects. He's also working on a lineup of 20 online instructional videos.
Greer had a nontraditional path to the maker community. After working for nearly two decades as a management consultant, he felt the urge to work on a project that gives back. He got an MBA from University of Chicago Booth School of Business with a focus in entrepreneurship, and made a list of the technologies he believed would revolutionize the world in the near future, such as autonomous cars, drones and nanotechnology. At the time, he thought 3D printing would be a game changer but as it caught on more in manufacturing, he wondered if there was another more consumer-focused technology that would get more people involved in engineering. That led to his idea to build accessible Arduino-based maker kits.
Greer is selling approximately 170 kits through the Indiegogo campaign starting at $49. In the future, Greer hopes to create a second volume of the kits that include more sensors and parts.
Makexchange Inventor's Kit from Pat McPherson on Vimeo.
