Capitalist tools coming: TechShop to open DIY fabrication studio
Original Source: http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20110724/FREE/307249986/capitalist-tools-coming-techshop-to-open-diy-fabrication-studio#
Ford Motor Co. is expected to formally announce next week at the Maker Faire that a shop filled with every imag-inable tool and machine to turn ideas into manufactured goods will open this fall at a former Ford training center in Allen Park.
TechShop Inc. was founded as a for-profit company in 2006 in Menlo Park, Calif., in Silicon Valley. It opened a TechShop in San Francisco last December and one in San Jose in June, and executives are in discussions to open others in Boston; New York; Washington, D.C.; Cincinnati; Los Angeles; Portland, Ore.; and Seattle.
The Allen Park TechShop is scheduled to open Nov. 18 in about 15,000 square feet of a 38,000-square-foot office building at 800 Republic Drive, a former Ford training center owned by Ford Motor Land Development Corp.
"We call ourselves a membership-based, do-it-yourself fabrication studio," said CEO Mark Hatch. Membership is $100 a month and is open to anyone 18 and older. TechShop has 750 members each in its Menlo Park and San Francisco operations and is targeting 800 to 1,000 in Allen Park after a year.