Wednesday, July 20, 2011

75 Days until the Grand Opening!

The clock is ticking down until the big day and it is time for you to get involved!

What exactly is AssentWorks?
AssentWorks is a community driven, non-profit prototyping facility aimed at Manitoban industry. We're focused on bringing, growing and extending opportunity in Manitoba by creating access to skill and knowledge in fabrication, industrial design and prototyping along with our industry partners and peers.

We need you to help build this community
We're having our first community planning session in August and we want you to come down and see what we're going to build together! We'll be touring the space, outlining the current activities and detailing the outstanding items we need to make our launch a success.

To get the specifics on dates and locations please sign-up on the community mailing list.

Watch the AssentWorks Concept and Status Update Video
Our "draft" membership and sponsorship video has been released which will be followed up with a set of formal videos just before the grand opening. The intent of this first video is to communicate the background and motivation of why we started this initiative. We released video as non-public, because we felt it is representative of what an audience targeted video should look like. As with many things that are volunteer based, time has kept on moving forward and we'd rather release the video as a rapid prototype itself then wait another few weeks. 


Fill out the AssentWorks Usage Questionnaire
The AssentWorks Usage Questionnaire is designed to help us understand more about what potential members are looking for the most in a Prototyping and Industrial Design shop. Please fill this out and pass it along to other potential members. You'll be seeing this communicated through our partners in the following few weeks.

What has been going on this month?
Space renovations continue as the basic walls and electrical have been checked over. The next phase of electrical and HVAC upgrades will be starting in the next two weeks. Please pop an us an email if you'd like to come volunteer with renovations. We have lots of different tasks to do in order to get the place in shape.

Thanks to our supporters!
A big thanks to the organizations that have pitched in, provided support and some great advisement regarding the development activities this month, including: Aquaventronics, Circle Design Incorporated, Economic Development Winnipeg / YES! Winnipeg, John Vukelic, Kerry Stevenson (Editor of Fabbaloo)Seccuris, SkullSpace and Technology Revolution.(Sorry to the folks I missed!)

Monday, July 4, 2011

90 Days until the Grand Opening!

Lots of developments at AssenWorks this month and things are just getting started!

Framing of the space is almost complete, with electrical starting within the next week. The first two pieces of specialty equipment, the CNC Router and small 3D printer have been specified and will be ordered in the next week. The rest of initial equipment orders have been drawn out and are awaiting for confirmation via the questionnaire prior to order next month.

We will be releasing a preliminary membership and sponsorship video on the website in the upcoming week, which will detail the features of membership and the benefits of sponsorship. This will be followed by our AssentWorks Usage Questionnaire which is designed to help us understand more about what potential members are looking for the most in a Prototyping and Industrial Design shop. The questionnaire will be available via the web site and will also be distributed by our supporting and advising partner organizations.

Many thanks to the awesome folks and great neighbors at SkullSpace, Winnipeg's first, only and best HackerSpace. The assistance on renovations and build out has been greatly appreciated. For those who don't know what SkullSpace is, check out www.SkullSpace.ca or come out to a regular meeting every Tuesday at 6pm @ 125 Adelaide or a Hackathon on the third Saturday of every month.