DARPA Pays $3.5 Million For New TechShops and Secret Reconfigurable Factories 116
pacopico writes "Businessweek reports that DARPA will pay for the creation of two new TechShops in Washington D.C. and Pittsburgh. The $3.5 million deal includes 2,000 TechShop memberships for military veterans and will have DARPA employees performing top secret work at night. 'The project is called iFab. For a month, a given factory might use dozens of machines to make parts for helicopters. Then you reboot the software controlling the machines, and out come the parts for the drive train system in a tank. The Darpa workers at TechShop will try to figure out which tools and methods can be used to rewire factories in this fashion.' Maker mayhem."
Re:Hmmm (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, after all, the US only exports $1.5 trillion dollars worth of good every year. Just the second largest exporter in the world (second to China, despite having less than 1/3 the population). Yeah, the US doesn't make anything these days.
Better linking... (Score:5, Informative)
Top secret work? (Score:4, Informative)
Nowhere in the article is any mention that the DARPA employees would be doing TS work.
Periods processing of the sort required to do TS work at night in a facility used by civilians during the day is basically impossible...
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Informative)