For meet your neighbor this week I came to see Derick Lee, he
has been provided a space to run FLEET at Type A Machines.
We arrived a little
early (my son really wanted to come) and while we waited were given a tour of
Type A Machines by Espen. He took us around and showed us models, printers and
explained the process and application for the 3D printing technology, he patiently answered all our
questions. He gave me his card, our guide was Espen Sivertsen, the CEO of Type A Machines. Thanks Espen.
Derick Arrived.
Who are you and what do you do?
What a tough question. The fundamental truth of that is that
I am a resident of San Leandro that has been here his whole life and I want to
make this city great. There are certain
steps to get there and we have to start with step 1. Step 1 I believe is education and getting our
students fundamentally prepared. Not
just attract businesses like this (Type A Machines) which is great, which
provides opportunities but really working into the core of where our people are
who are vested in this town and have lived here their whole lives and incubate
them, have them grow out and make their own businesses have them be talented
individuals who work at the companies .
I believe that we need to prepare our people that live here and it
starts with the youth
What do you love about San Leandro?
Before or after I got engaged? Before I got engaged I liked it being a
quiet, safe neighborhood with a lot of good people. The people who came out of this place are
very diverse and very diverse minded, very open minded. You don't necessarily get that from Hayward
and Oakland which is interesting.
After I got engaged , I mean wow. The business community, the government
community, community in general , educational community has all tied in
together. So again it's about the
people, the people thread it together. I
think that is a resent thing too, that is what I have witnessed, everyone across
all the sectors are working together.
When you get into that, they support you. That's what I have experienced about San
Leandro..
I understand you received an award, the Makers and innovators
award of the year, can you tell me about that?
I didn't expect it, I go to the chamber every few days, I chat with Cece, chat with Dave . Passing information, hanging out, They understand what has been happening, what
I have been trying to do, what I have worked on and what I am trying to push. Whether it's starting a company like FLEET,
which they are a fiscal agent of, or wanting to do the video and hiring someone to work on that.
Or other ideas that pop up because we are
talking about it. They know everything
that I have been working on, they understand my mission.
I had a wonderful chat with Lisa Jackson about FLEET and got
really excited, tell me about your involvement with that?
Fleet essentially a delivery service for emerging
technologies . Our city is looking to
transform itself in to a center for innovation and technology and is gaining
momentum. Our citizens have no idea what
these technologies are 3D printing, laser cutting. They have heard about it,
read about it, seen it on you tube, but they haven't seen it in person, or
touched it in person. Our goal was to expose people to those technologies so
they can understand what it is about. So
maybe they can be empowered to use it .
And that's going into schools?
It was going to go to just the broad community at first, but what our focus is on is schools
(as the program develops).
I hear you have a bus?
Yes, our bus is the start to how we got mobilized. but when
we are talking about schools, we are also talking about high impact, impacting
more people that can fit in a bus. There
is only 20 or 30 people that can actually fit in a bus, then people leave for the next group to come
in and be exposed, there is an issue with capacity. So we are thinking of auditorium
events, bus less events where we can impact over 100 students at one time. Just had a meeting with San Lorenzo High and
they want our bus March 31st and they want to impact 600 students.
What Stuff do you take?
 |
| Type A Machines 3D Printer |
Stuff from Type A Machines (in picture), Phase space, Sound fit. That cube looking thing right there, it's a
3D scanner . What they do is ear fit,
they can make molds, 3D scan it into digital and then print it with any
material that's rubber and flexible, they do hearing aids, bio-medical use. Method Machines which has robotic arms.
What we are doing is pulling in these partners with their
employees. Say we get Tim Holmes and we
get Scot McGregor and Angie from Methods and we develop an event. My friend Jeff Lou, who will be joining us
shortly, calls it "an away team".
We are creating these resources that we have as partners, grabbing their
human resource and their knowledge, bringing them to these events to expose
potentially thousands of students. That
way we have a model of not just training our own staff and try and sustain that, but employee consultants from the companies that we work with. Those two people (pointing across the warehouse)
they don't work for Type A . They work
for their own company Design, Build Draw.
They are just incubating here.
Huge co-working space. Essentially
we are pooling consultants and different free lancers from these companies to bond, to solve challenges.
 |
| Derick explains to my son how a laser cutter works |
I could see the FLEET bus being great for after school
programs?
That is further along on our timeline, creating a meaningful
long-term program, so it is actually effective in the work place. Everyone is going to work eventually. How do we pull information from our partners
and create pilot programs for work based learning, which is like internships,
job shadows, who do we pull data from these companies to inform and create curriculum.
Parting Words?
Take the first step
Thanks Derick
After the interview Tim Homles rolled by on his long board
to say Hi, the atmosphere is relaxed at Type A but there is definitely a
creative focus within the space. When we left my son said that he could really
see himself working somewhere like Type A, I can see why.
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