CRL PILOT LAUNCHED!

After many months of planning, the formation of the CRL team, developing supporting partnerships and after sifting through hundreds of applications before hearing over 50 pitches… the CRL Pilot Programme has launched!

We are London’s incubator for start-ups that design and make physical products.

The 11 innovative start-ups that were successful in gaining a place on the first CRL programme have now moved into our new workspace and prototyping lab atThe Old Vinyl Factory, Hayes.

After two jam packed induction days which introduced them to the full scale of the programme, facilities on offer and each other, they’ve now been matched with their mentors and met our full team. Incredible progress and linkages are already being made.

For the next 12 months, each of our teams will have 24/7 access to our shared studio and high-spec prototyping lab. They’ll receive day-to-day support from our full-time team of design, manufacturing and sustainability experts and access to a rich program of master classes covering all aspects of launching a hardware start-up — from industrial design to business planning, marketing and fulfillment.

You can watch our video — What We’re All About — as an introduction to the background to the CRL programme pilot programme development.

But perhaps more important than all of that, together we’re creating an exciting new community here in Hayes; a place where invention happens, businesses are built and lives changed.

And this is only the beginning for CRL. We’re using this Pilot year to inform our plans for much bigger things to come.

Over the coming days and weeks, we’ll be introducing our teams, the staff that run the CRL and our wider network to you. Alongside this we hope to share some of our thinking and the expertise developed around what it takes to bring thoughtfully created and quality products to the market. So watch this space!

02/10/2015 written by JAMES NETTLETON