Case Studies 56 Arduino

Case Studies 56 Arduino At a glance: Type of Organisation: Business Aim: Energy and environment, Smart public services, Pioneering science Technology Trends: Open Networks, Open Knowledge, Open Hardware DSI activities: A network, Operating a DSI service Key facts: Over 300,000 official Arduinos has been commercially produced Website: http://arduino.cc/ Organisation Name Arduino Short description The core to an Arduino is a simple, ultra-low-cost circuit board, based on an open-source design, armed with a microprocessor which can be programmed with simple, open-source software tools by the user. The idea is that anyone should be able to turn an Arduino into a simple electronic device such as a light switch and sensor. Type of organisation Arduino is a business based in Italy. History and mission Released in 2005, Massimo Banzi, an Italian engineer and designer, started the Arduino project to enable students at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea (IDII) build all kinds of electronic contraptions using an open-source hardware board. The software consists of a standard programming language compiler and a boot loader that executes on the micro controller. The project first started with 3,000 euros for the production of 200 units, but when IDDI bought only 50 units, the Arduino team decided to put the remaining units up for sale; and developed a business after realising the board’s broader applications for multidis- ciplinary projects. Arduino has since grown to become popular–selling around 200,000 units in 2011–largely because of its creators’ decision to make the board’s design “open source” and its quick adoption by hobbyists, artists, scientists, and ‘makers.’ 57 What does it do, and how does this activity enhance social innovation? Arduino is a key player in the international maker movement of D.I.Y. hardware hobbyists and tinkerers. A quick survey of the multitude of diverse projects demonstrates how it has enabled a spin-off of collaboration and creativity. Furthermore, Arduino’s ready acceptance that sometimes its own community will have better solutions to some of the technological challenges they encounter (see for example the case of Complubot elaborated on below, where Arduino co-founder Massimo Banzi enlisted the help of two Spanish kids who had made a prize-win- ning Arduino powered Complubot robot, when he was approached to make an educational Arduino-based robot for kids). This demonstrates an ability to devolve power outside traditional channels in order to enable innovation to occur. What is the social impact it is seeking, including any evidence of impact to date? The arrival of Arduino is said to mark the move from open-source software to open-source hardware. Arduino has been described as “LEGO for electronics” in its easy-to-use approach. Furthermore, Arduino has significantly lowered the economic barriers to D.I.Y. electronics thanks to the product’s low cost and open source business model. The Arduino designers freely share the specifications for anyone to use, and third-par- ty manufacturers all over the world offer versions of their own, which are often further developed for specific purposes. Importantly, the social impact of creations developed by Arduino users themselves has been notably wide-reaching – an interesting example with a clear social impact is PHDuino . This is an example of how student scientists are using Arduino-based hardware to replicate scientific equip- ment using more readily available components in developing countries. Furthermore, the company highlights that official Arduino boards are “made in Italy”, thus not using cheap labour and low quality materials: to emphasise this they had the Italian map stamped on the front of the first board, and also the names they used recall their Italian origin (e.g. Arduino Duemilanove, Arduino Diecimila, and Arduino Uno which is the latest version). What is the role of the organisation within the DSI ecosystem? Much like GitHub and Raspberry Pi, Arduino might in some ways be said to form part of the very DSI architecture. Various educational and innovative projects and products have been built on the back of Ardui- no’s hard and software. This is very likely the result of Arduino’s clear organisational focus on collaboration and sharing amongst its community. What technological methods is it using? Arduino has been designed so that it can sense the surrounding environment by receiving input from a variety of sensors and, vice versa, can affect its surroundings by controlling lights, motors, and other actuators. The micro controller on the board is programmed using the Arduino programming language (based on Wiring) and the Arduino development environment (based on Processing). Arduino projects can be stand-alone or they can communicate with software running on a computer (e.g. Flash, Processing, MaxMSP). 58 The boards can be built by hand or purchased preassembled and the software can be downloaded for free. The hardware reference designs (CAD files) are available under an open-source license, and users are free to adapt them to their needs. While the hardware used to power Arduino is open-source, Arduino software is also open-source. The source code for the Java environment is released under the GPL and the C/C++ micro controller libraries are licensed under the LGPL. What technological methods and tools is it using, and what did these enable that was not previously possible? During a TED Talk on Arduino, Banzi said Arduino has been a significant catalyst in the ‘Makers’ Movement.’ Arduino has in many senses her- alded a paradigm shift from open-source software alone to open-source hardware. Correspondingly, Arduino’s low economic threshold has removed a lot of potential barriers to users previously excluded from get- ting involved in D.I.Y. hardware and robotics – the availability of Arduino hardware design blueprints for download has meant users who ordinari- ly might not have been able to afford or order the boards have been able to build the boards themselves by hand. Enhancing collaboration and engagement: DSI network effect The other way in which Arduino demonstrates technological collaboration is the way that Banzi has relied upon pre-existing advances made by the Arduino community when trying to find particular technological solutions: For example, take the case of a Spanish team called Com- plubot composed of two kids: Nerea and Iván. Together with their coach, Eduardo, they competed for – and won – the Soccer B category at the World Series of the RoboCup Junior (for high school students). When Arduino co-founder Massimo Banzi was approached to make an educational Arduino-based robot for kids he contacted the Complubot team to enlist their help because of their knowledge and experience in this area. The Arduino@Heart program is a Brand License Agreement designed for makers and companies wanting to make their products easily recognisa- ble as based on the Arduino technology with a fee for them reaching the maximum of five per cent of the wholesale price. Arduino supports @ Heart partners through promotion of their brand, products and content on its site and social networks with links to documentation and tuto- rials. This helps ensure that partners’ brands are marketed to the right target groups and are clearly associated with Arduino. Incidentally, one of these Arduino@Heart is the Smart Citizen Kit – a hardware kit to gather environmental data, which itself is the subject of one of the case studies in this report. How is the organisation funded? The organisation makes a relatively small amount from the sale of each board (only a few euros of the total price), which gets rolled into the next production cycle. The Arduino team has created a company based on giving everything away. On its website, it posts all of its trade secrets for anyone to take – all the schematics, design files, and software for the Arduino board. Arduino design plans can thus be downloaded and man- ufactured by anyone; as there are no patents. These plans can be sent off to a factory, where the circuit boards are mass-produced and sold by anyone who wishes to do so - without paying the Arduino team anything in royalties. 59 All of this is allowed to happen because the Arduino board is a piece of open source hardware, free for anyone to use, modify, or sell. Banzi and his team have spent precious billable hours making the thing, yet unlike conventional proprietary business models, they sell it themselves for a small profit – while allowing anyone else to do the same. Arduino offers an interesting example of how an organisation might be sustainable and open in nature. In fact, the organisation’s more significant income comes from clients who want to build devices based on the board and who hire the founders as consultants. What were the main barriers to innovate? Many questioned if it would be possible to forge a sustainable business model considering the entire basis for Arduino relies upon open source technologies (in fact, the only piece of Intellectual Property (IP) the team protects is the name Arduino, the main asset of the company which is trademarked in order to ensure that the brand name is not negatively influenced by low quality copies. Anyone who is willing to sell boards using that name has to pay a small fee to Arduino). Despite this, Arduino has established itself as a thriving worldwide business – in spite of giving away all the data required to build Arduinos completely free. Some commentators have gone further to suggest that Arduino has also short-circuited most conventional industrial infrastructure by ‘placing the ability to create wealth directly in the hands of private individuals.’ In many respects, Arduino has charted an alternative modus operandi for technology companies of the future: the notion that companies and private individuals can give away their primary products, while making a living on the sideline activities that such donations attract.

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