You may have probably heard about Raspberry PI single board computers if you love hardware technology. Their use is diverse with some people using them to learn programming skills, build hardware projects, do home automation, implement Kubernetes clusters and Edge computing, and even use them in industrial applications.
In the last decade, over 50 million Raspberry PI devices were sold worldwide.
The company has announced a new partnership with a Kenyan company, Gearbox Europlacer (https://www.pcb.africa), to produce some of its flagship hardware devices. Gearbox Europlacer, is a world class electronics manufacturing services provider (EMS) based in Industrial Area in Nairobi.
The company began its operations in 2021 to catalyse the development of best-fit intelligent African solutions that solve African problems, serving young innovators to mature companies in a variety of growth positive sectors such Agritech, climate change, electric mobility, smart metering solutions among others.
Njunge and Dr eben at Gearbox Europlacer
The company has manufactured solutions for a number of local startups in the electric mobility, education sector and agriculture.
Gearbox Europlacer is a joint venture between a Kenyan owned maker/product realisation space called organisation Gearbox that has been instrumental in supporting local hardware innovations since 2014, Europlacer, a British-owned Surface mount technology (SMT) equipment manufacturer fully owned by a Christian charity Parable Trust and Wellers Impact, UK based impact investment firm with extensive experience in Africa.
The Raspberry Pi is working with local partners to include computing to the local STEM curriculum. The partnership with Gearbox Europlacer will increase access to these computing solutions that were previously difficult to procure.
Production of Raspberry PI devices in the Kenyan facility will start in November 2022 and will bear a ‘Made in Kenya’ mark and will be available to its customers both in Kenya and the East and central Africa region.