February Cambridge IoT meetup
Yesterday we had our first meeting of 2014 of the Cambridge Internet of Things meetup group at Makespace, the local Cambridge hackerspace. The venue was packed with about fifty people to hear talks from Pilgrim Beart and Patrick Bergel.
The most memorable quote of the night was probably from Patrick:
Kickstarter, the rectal thermometer of hipster desire
… much as I’d like to, I don’t think I’ll be able to pull that off in a talk.
As well as being entertaining, the presentations gave us a lot to think about and to debate in the pub afterwards: the future of IoT technology, standards, and are the really important problems we should be solving with IoT?
I’m already looking forward to next months talks!
Many thanks to our speakers and venue for a great night:
Pilgrim Beart has a passion to change the world for the better. He has more than 20 years’ experience leading innovation in ground breaking, high-technology companies, three of which he co-founded. After a degree in Computer Engineering, Pilgrim designed innovative computer systems at start-ups in Cambridge and Oxford, then for six years led technology teams in three start-ups in Silicon Valley. In 1998 he headed back to his home town of Cambridge, UK where over the past 15+ years he has co-founded four companies: activeRF (indoor location systems), antenova (multi-band smartphone antenna systems), AlertMe (a Smart Home platform used for Home Energy Management) where he is currently Founder Director and 1248 (a horizontal IoT play). Pilgrim is a Fellow of the IET, a Visitor at the Cambridge University Computer Laboratory, and chairs the CEDIG consumer energy display industry group.
Patrick Bergel is Founder & CEO of Animal Systems, a creative technology company. Animal Systems recently launched Chirp, a new platform for sharing data with sound, which has gone on to be a Top 20 application in 60 countries worldwide. He previously founded mobile search startup L6, and has led research into sound control surfaces and ubiquitous computing systems. Patrick is also an Honorary Research Associate at UCL (CS), and a member of BBC-funded audio research group the New Radiophonics Workshop.
Makespace is a community run space, that houses manufacturing and prototyping kit and provides the surroundings to meet, work, build, socialise and do amazing things. Makespace has three main aims – to support existing and new businesses, to raise awareness of and skills in engineering and manufacturing, and to provide a fun place for people to hangout and work on projects.