Chen Xiaochun, Zhong Yan

Beila1998@163.com

WHEN it comes to sharing ideas, makerspaces are the first things that come to mind. A new makerspace called LAB ZERO officially opened Saturday with an opening party that brought makers and hackers interested in electronics and engineering to their space in Nanshan.

The predecessor of LAB ZERO was Techspace, one of the earliest makerspaces in Shenzhen. When Techspace moved away, two of its members, identified as Lit and Fiona, opened their own educational makerspace next door and named it Litchee Lab.

Now, Litchee Lab is moving to another space, but they want to preserve the original space where the maker community has been growing. Therefore LAB ZERO was born to take the place of Litchee Lab.

According to one of the co-founders of LAB ZERO, Janek Mann from Germany, the reason they chose Shenzhen as the birthplace of their makerspace is that Shenzhen is an inclusive and friendly city, which perfectly matches the city’s slogan, “Once you’re in Shenzhen, you are a Shenzhener.”

“It is very easy to feel at home in Shenzhen. I think Shenzhen is a great place for people to come and start something new,” Mann added.

“Nanshan District in Shenzhen is basically known as the “Silicon Valley in China,’” said Alexey Tsverov from Russia, another co-founder of LAB ZERO.

Mann said another reason is that Shenzhen is actually a place that connects the supply chain together, even though a lot of factories are in Dongguan, Foshan and other Pearl River delta cities. “In Shenzhen, you have all the representatives of the factories here. You have easy access to materials and components here,” Mann told the Shenzhen Daily.

A makerspace is a community of makers and hackers who are interested in physical computing, Internet of things and just building things in general. In Shenzhen, a number of makerspaces have been popping up, mostly in Huaqiangbei, which is known as the biggest electronics market in China.