Last year saw the first Maker Faire take place in Rome and it was an unexpected runaway success, both for the public and exhibitiors. Judging by the excitement and the intention expressed by many of the top 3D printing – and 3D scanning – companies in Italy to participate and present their new products, the success of this second edition can be taken for granted, though it might be even bigger than expected.
This year the organizing team has been working really hard to make MF Rome a really wide reaching event showcasing the entire world of making. 3D printing will have a central role in all this, with many of the top 3D printing companies, led by Italian leaders Sharebot and DWS, attending. Among others, Italian 3D printer manufactures Strato figures as official “fan”, as well as Dutch manufacturer Ultimaker.
The Rome Maker Faire, taking place from October 3rd to the 5th, will be the final part of a week long celebration appropriately named The Innovation Week, starting September 27th, where over 600 new inventions will be showcased in a 70.000 square meter exhibition area, the Auditorium Parco della Musica, designed by Renzo Piano. It will be preceded by a software hackathon at Rome’s MaXXI art museum.
This year over 600 projects were submitted and will be the focus of 74 talks and 42 workshops, with participants coming from 33 different nations. With Intel as main sponsor, the event will focus primarily on the youth with many activities targeted specifically at under 20’s with the morning of October 3rd dedicated entirely to schools.
The Innovations Week’s goal will be to give as much visibility as possible to new projects by young people who, in spite of the many difficulties of the Italian economic landscape, continue to try to innovate, using their knowledge and the new means for personal, digital manufacturing.
Software giant Autodesk will also be a silver sponsor of the event. Along with 3D Hubs, another international company that is growing very rapidly in Italy, it will exhibit on the show floor and continue to spread the awareness of its consumer products, especially the 123D App suite of software, focusing specifically on design for 3D printing. Other Silver sponsors include Microsoft and Atmel.
The sponsor and supporter line up is actually enormous and spans across many different sectors, from the civil and political arena, with the Rome Chamber of Commerce, the City and Region of Rome and Lazio, the Italian Ministry of University and Research (MIUR) and even the United States Embassy in Italy, to more directly involved entities such as the European Maker Camp and the 3D Printing Association.
Arduino, the hardware manufacturer that powers many RepRap 3D printers will play a major role and rumours have surfaced that the company may even be launching its own 3D printing hardware, along with many start-up incubators (including the well known Mind the Bridge foundation and Universities).
Eni, the Italian oil giant, is also a Gold sponsor of the event and, much like Chevron in the US, has taken a strong interest in the possibilities of a cleaner and more sustainable world that might arise out of the creativity and inventiveness of the personalized manufacturing world. That is one of the aspects of 3D printing and personalized manufacturing in general that I, and many like me, appreciate the most.
