Know Hub Chile and engineering firm C3D sign collaboration agreement

Know Hub Chile, a nonprofit corporation whose goal is to help Chile become a knowledge-based economy and society, signed a collaboration agreement with C3D, a company dedicated to developing hardware-based technology products that also serves as a technology partner for companies and startups that need help developing their technology products and services.

The innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem earns that name thanks to the many interactions among its different participants. Because of that very characteristic, collaboration is a highly relevant element. Innovation does not happen in isolation; it is the product of positive interaction among different players, which contributes to its development.

Along these lines, Know Hub Chile, a nonprofit corporation whose goal is to help Chile become a knowledge-based economy and society, recently signed a collaboration agreement with engineering firm C3D, a company dedicated to developing hardware-based technology products that also serves as a technology partner for companies and startups that need help developing their technology products and services.

By signing a collaboration agreement at C3D’s offices, Javier Ramírez, executive director of Know Hub Chile, and Juan Pablo Oyarzún, general manager of C3D, expressed their interest in starting a cooperative relationship to develop partnership and collaboration models in areas of interest to both institutions.

Innovation ecosystem

“At Know Hub Chile, we are very pleased to have a new strategic ally who will join the group of people and institutions working together so that ventures have a greater chance of reaching the market, and so that, together, we can help Chile become a knowledge-based society and economy,” says Javier Ramírez, executive director of Know Hub Chile, about the agreement.

Juan Pablo Oyarzún, general manager of C3D, notes that, as an engineering company focused on developing technology products, achieving a stronger connection with the innovation ecosystem through what he considers “a very dynamic player, like Know Hub Chile” is a very significant step for his organization.

This collaboration agreement will allow them, Oyarzún adds, “to reach the challenges we want to develop, to open up new opportunities, new challenges, which are the ideas in potential companies and startups, and take them along a path of prototyping and scaling.”

Depending on the stage of the idea or development of those companies and startups, C3D offers different forms of collaboration, such as exploring the most relevant technical challenges through experiments and PoCs to determine the best direction for a solution. It also collaborates through prototyping, that is, developing prototypes iteratively to test, draw conclusions and pivot until reaching the minimum viable product. It also collaborates on manufacturing, scaling the solution so that it can be manufactured and produced at scale.

“C3D targets the ‘pain points’ that exist in industry in Chile. On one hand, there is having the knowledge to apply different branches of engineering to materialize an idea or product, and at the same time, offering that materialization to companies in an integrated way. We have that capacity to offer everything in an integrated way, to push the idea from imagination to real scale-up,” says Oyarzún.

For C3D’s manager, the need in Chile for access to companies that combine development and innovation capabilities is clear. “It has always been difficult in a country like Chile, which has no tradition of manufacturing industry. There is no tradition of developing much technology industry, which is why it is important to raise visibility.” Its work is of great value in the development of the national innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem, and it is in that same spirit that the company joins forces with Know Hub Chile.