Hey everyone! Regardless of whether you are already a member of our community, of if you are visiting us for the very first time, know that we welcome you with open arms! Earlier today, we just had an amazing discussion with our new community partners, DesignSpark. DesignSpark is a maker's community established by RS Components from roughly 6 years ago, and to date, they already have a whopping membership of 657,000+ members, 23 tech hubs and over 3600 articles online. Truly an amazing achievement.
More Potential for Growth
In our call where we spoke about a number of items on our agenda, one of which was acknowledging that DesignSpark really has the potential to reach a lot more people. With a dedicated learning platform & community like OLS, we can potentially join forces to bring a combined community that is both strong, not just in the makers & projects aspect, but also in the education and skills development portion. By working together, we will be able to not only provide a holistic environment for makers, but also a place where they can innovate and invent beyond their imaginations.
By working together, we will be able to not only provide a holistic environment for makers, but also a place where they can innovate and invent beyond their imaginations.
Though we are not going to be sitting under the same umbrella, we have both agreed that there is a significant advantage that OLS maintains as an independent platform. Being independent, it allows us to be able to host any kind of brand or range of products that we believe is relevant. Even if the particular brand has no prior relationship with RS Components, through this learning platform, it can become the perfect test bed for them to seek potential traction. Just speculating about the potential in the near future, many of those brands may one day become a supplier for RS Components as well.
Even if the particular brand has no prior relationship with RS Components, through this learning platform, it can become the perfect test bed for them to seek potential traction.
As a community, individually we have our strengths. We were absolutely honest with them about how there is room and potential for much more content on their website and we were also frank about how we are meant to be a dedicated education & skills development platform. For onlinelabseries, we may, or may not ever become a maker's community per say. To be honest, that is really not in our long-term vision at the moment. Hence, for DesignSpark to step into the picture would really complete everything full-circle.
For onlinelabseries, we may, or may not ever become a maker's community per say. To be honest, that is really not in our long-term vision at the moment. Hence, for DesignSpark to step into the picture would really complete everything full-circle.
Linking Up...Literally Speaking
As individual platforms, we have agreed that it is best for us to take things one step at a time. We did explore some of the ideas of what is possible in the near future, which includes dedicated lab series that will educate community members (on both sides) about how to make full use of the available software and tools that are available from the DesignSpark website.
But first things first, we will be setting up links on both our menu sections that will provide a direct link to each other's communities. This way, members from OLS and DesignSpark will be able to easily navigate back and forth between the portals. In the near future, we might even be able to link up related content and recorded lab session videos, or even to upcoming lab series related to a particular brand or product.
In the near future, we might even be able to link up related content and recorded lab session videos, or even to upcoming lab series related to a particular brand or product.
Thanks to Wix and what their platform is capable of providing, we are confident that Wix as a website hosting platform will be stable enough for us to support up to 3 million community members in the next 3~4 years.
Thanks to Wix and what their platform is capable of providing, we are confident that Wix as a website hosting platform will be stable enough for us to support up to 3 million community members in the next 3~4 years. But until such a time where we need to consider other alternatives, we will be sticking to Wix due to it's affordability & stability at the moment (since we ultimately rely on public and member donations to help us pay for things).
Sneak Peak
What is an announcement if there isn't any sneak peak into what might be coming your way. In our conversation, we also spoke about the idea of a potential dedicated lab series for Intel. Yes, you have not heard us wrong. Now, as a learning platform, and because of how critical we are when it comes to the kind of brand and products we want to showcase, at first it might seem like we will actually say no to showcasing Intel's products on the IoT Platform. But hold your horses.
To be fair and unbiased, we believe that every single brand on the market should have an equal opportunity, but we also want to be sure that by showcasing them to potentially millions of viewers worldwide, that their product indeed has substance. It is not an unknown secret that Intel hasn't been a favourite when it comes to IoT products. They have been trying honestly, but somehow, it just didn't seem to take off, why is that? The adoption by the maker's community is quite literally...suffering in numbers, why?
To be fair and unbiased, we believe that every single brand on the market should have an equal opportunity, but we also want to be sure that by showcasing them to potentially millions of viewers worldwide, that their product indeed has substance.
Well, here is our assessment, we think that their price range is honestly quite high. From a maker's perspective, most makers will immediately rule out their ability to afford the product, no matter how good it might be (or promises to be). That's the reality. Now, we are not here to say that Intel should lower their prices too. We believe that when something is honestly great, it usually isn't cheap too. Which is why we are willing to help Intel by having a dedicated lab series that will really deep-dive into the product's features and functionalities. This is not a product review or product info/introduction type of video, but we will really dive in to the nuts-and-bolts. We will explore all of their potential use-cases and figure where in the application/deployment spectrum will their products be best fitted. We at onlinelabseries do genuinely believe that Intel has a potential to join the giants when it comes to IoT products, but they really aren't quite there yet. Maybe with onlinelabseries, they really might stand a good chance now. Well, we will see.
We will explore all of their potential use-cases and figure where in the application/deployment spectrum will their products be best fitted. We at onlinelabseries do genuinely believe that Intel has a potential to join the giants when it comes to IoT products, but they really aren't quite there yet.
For the potential end-users, if they can gain a much better understanding of how Intel's IoT products can help them to solve specific problems or types of problems, it can really help to level-out the pricing and value weighing scale.
And Other Semiconductor Manufacturers, Electronic Makers/Brands
RS Components is a serious electronics distributor with a real stake on a global scale. On that note, we have also spoken about the possibility of building that bridge between a target brand like NXP, Microchip, Texas Instruments, STMicroelectronics, Tektronix, Teledyne LeCroy and more, together with onlinelabseries, with RS Components being that bridge in-between. Honestly, to us that represents a huge potential for growth as well as the opportunity to expand our lab series even further over the course of the next 12 months and more.
Truly, with this amazing partnership between our communities, we now have an even clearer view of our vision as well as our path towards the goals and pledges we have set for 2020 and 2022.
So, here's a huge thanks to the DesignSpark team, and thank you to specific individuals like Mike Bray, VP of DesignSpark, and also Kelvin Tse from the Hong Kong office. On behalf of the entire learning platform and community, we express our deepest gratitude for the opportunity to become long-term partners in shaping the world through innovation as well as providing high-quality free education for everyone.