Are Fab Labs Going to Spur the Next Technological Revolution?

Source: CPA Insider

The article is based in part on a new book, FAB: The Coming Revolution on Your Desktop—From Personal Computers to Personal Fabrication, by Neil Gershenfeld, director of the Center for Bits and Atoms at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Fab systems may be the next technological revolution, allowing people to manufacture appliances in their home laboratories. These appliances may be less expensive and better than what can be purchased now, and they can also be repaired at home.

Examples of products already created under this system include:

• Norwegian herders created a wireless system using tags to track their flocks.
• Children converted trash into jewelry.
• Students created an “alarm lock” that must be wrestled to turn off.
• Alan Alda “fabbed” a camera that eliminates red-eye.

It is possible to make a cellular phone in a fab lab.

It now costs about $20,000 for a lab including a milling machine for precision parts, laser cutters to make circuit boards, and software for programming chips. In a few years the prices are expected to drop to an affordable range.

Imagine the implications for financial executives in manufacturing and for their accountants.

From: CPA Insider, August 22, 2005. For the complete article, click on the following link: https://www.cpa2biz.com/News/Columnists/Telberg/Whats+Bill+Gates+Thinking+Now.htm.