“Technotronic” (#1503)

Synopsis

Jim Newton, Founder & Chairman, TechShop, Mark Hatch, CEO, TechShop, Will Baird, Team Phoenicia, Jonathan Thorn, Lightning Motorcycles, Michael Pinneo, Ridge Technologies. Topic: TechShop.

When you're looking for an example of a huge fast marketing splash, few have been more effective than Jo Bogaert. He's the Belgian music producer who, in 1988, created the "Techtronic” sound that spread like wildfire over land, air and ocean to seemingly everything and every place that played music. His global hit single "Pump Up the Jam" with vocalist Ya Kid K was ubiquitous whether you were at a club in New York, an elevator in Tokyo or a cafe in Paris. The song and the sound spread like Kudzu and kept its grip on world music well into this decade.

Jim Newton wouldn't discourage a "viral" splash like that, but both he and his clients would really prefer to build it themselves. And that's exactly what they're doing at Tech Shop. Mr. Newton is the founder of this nationwide nirvana for those who never got enough of Industrial Arts in high school. But actually Tech Shop is much more since it allows anyone with a manufacturing idea, to create, design & produce that dream all for about the cost of joining your local YMCA.

For this week's special "On-the-Road" edition of Autoline, John McElroy takes you inside the original Menlo Park, California Tech Shop location. Here you'll meet some of the members of this creative community, experience their dreams coming to life and see why this idea is already spreading Technotronic-like across America, perhaps coming soon to a neighborhood near you.