ShopBot Jamboree draws big crowd

The eighth annual ShopBot Jamboree returned April 22-24 to Durham, N.C., with a focus on starting, running and growing a successful business using CNC or digital fabrication.

Approximately 200 fabricators, manufacturers, sign makers, cabinetmakers, and entrepreneurs from a variety of disciplines joined speakers, vendors and ShopBot staff for three days of training, application demonstrations, show-and-tell, presentations and networking with fellow ShopBot enthusiasts.

Highlights included:

James Booth of Vector Art 3D demonstrating how easy it can be to enhance the beauty of woodworking projects with value-added, ready-made 3-D designs.
Brian Moran and Tony McKenzie of Birmingham, England's Vectric software, which recently won the United Kingdom's Queen's Award for Enterprise, demonstrated their design software.
Thermwood's Dennis Englert discussed the collaboration between Thermwood and ShopBot that allows the eCabinet Systems software package to be run on a ShopBot CNC.
ShopBot's new small-format digital fabrication system, Tyro, was officially launched.
Christopher Gergen, professor at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business and co-author of Life Entrepreneurs,talked about the attributes that make successful entrepreneurs.
Sarah Evans of Boone, North Carolina's Appalachian Signs & Design gave a humorous presentation on her experiences of starting her own sign business, offered some nuts-and-bolts advice on how she prices and delivers her services, and even explained some of her materials and processes.

Ponoko founder David Ten Have discussed distributed manufacturing and how the ShopBot/Ponoko project 100kGarages is helping fabricators take part in the next wave of industry.

For information, visit www.shopbottools.com.

April 2010 4th

Woodshop News EditorsAuthor