Rurban has announced it launched a Kickstarter for Data Studio, a data center and tech hub for entrepreneurs in emerging communities.
"The vision is to give entrepreneurs a driven environment where they can come together and build new and better things, create jobs, and even inspire the next generation. It is beautiful to see people succeed and to bring opportunities to new places and that is what we are doing here,"said Josh Sanabria, CEO of Rurban.
The tech hub is a high energy office where startups can cross-pollinate ideas and develop products. The startups will rent space to grow their business and the Data Studio will connect them to professional networks, consultants, and funding.
The data center will offer critical networking, cloud computing, and app development platforms to the resident startups. It will also provide much needed internet exchange points to emerging communities.
Sanabria said the Data Studio is similar in vision to that of WikiHouse, an open source hardware and software platform for architecture; the Open Compute Project, launched in 2011 by Facebook to openly share designs of data center products; OpenStack, an open source cloud computing platform for public and private clouds; Internet.org, a global partnership dedicated to providing internet access to the two thirds of the world not yet connected; Escape the City, a website that connects people with exciting non-corporate job opportunities; and Elliptical Mobile Solutions, a developer of self-contained, cost-effective and energy efficient Micro-Modular Data Centers.
The Rurban Kickstarter campaign is raising $150,000 by March 31, 2014 for the architectural design of the Data Studio and a feasibility study to determine the first location. The program will offer participants different rewards based on amounts donated. Kickstarter is a crowd funding platform for creative projects. Since its launch in 2009, more than $995 million has been pledged by more than 5.7 million people, funding more than 56,000 projects.
ABOUT RURBAN: Founded in 2013, Rurban believes that with design and technology, markets around the world can enjoy strong growth while celebrating local identity. Its mission is to facilitate development by empowering local entrepreneurs to create dynamic and life-changing products. The Data Studio fulfills its vision of putting the tools for creation and implementation into the hands of the community, forming the roots of an innovative ecosystem.
