Harriet Green, CEO of Premier Farnell, the company behind element14, said: This partnership brings together the worlds biggest online design engineer community with one of the most exciting electronic/embedded computing products to be launched for decades. We believe it will provide the catalyst for a programming revolution. The opportunity to engage a new generation of engineers and computer experts is very much in our sweet spot as a company. Through our element14 Community we will encourage everyone from developers, modders, coders and programmers to discuss, share and develop their ideas and fully utilise the game-changing potential of the Raspberry Pi computer.
There has been real excitement in the marketplace around the launch of the Raspberry Pi computer, a device that takes its lead from a history of iconic educational-targeted computers that influenced the adoption of automation in industry, science and research from the late 1970s. Today design engineers and would-be coders across the world are clamouring to get their hands on the device to see how it can be modified and what innovative programs can be created to run on it.
The Raspberry Pi Foundation is a charity formed and supported by some influential computing minds and businesses. It believes in the need for more developers to understand what truly goes on under the hood of a computing device and is convinced there is a need to rely less on development tools and power hungry layers of code. The element14 Community has been supporting design engineers for over two years and offers organic support, expert advice and information to all members and a platform to share ideas and examples freely.
Eben Upton, co-founder of the Raspberry Pi Foundation, commented: The decline in core computing skills is something we really want to address with Raspberry Pi and the way the element14 Community supports developers of all skill levels makes it a really strong partner in tackling this issue. Overcoming the students fear of programming for the first time is a critical step in unlocking the full potential of the smartest people in any industry. I have no doubt that having the support of a community of like-minded developers will be a catalyst for success.
Robert Mullins, co-founder of Raspberry Pi Foundation, and Harriet Green, CEO of Premier Farnell, talk exclusively on video about why the computer was created, how element14 can support and why this is such a game changer in computing. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Gky68aE578
The distribution agreement, which will see Premier Farnell distribute in all its territories under the brands of Newark element14 in North America, Farnell element14 in Europe and element14 in Asia Pacific, offers the education-aimed computer available for just 22 or $35. Units are available for pre-order from 29 February on a first come first served basis and bundles of essential ancillary products such as cabling and power supplies have been added to the line-card to simplify users purchasing needs. See one of the first unboxing to hello world videos here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BbufUp_HNs
Initially the Raspberry Pi will be sold in one uncased configuration the Model B which has two USB slots, 256MB of RAM, HDMI slot, SD memory card slot and an Ethernet port. This will be followed later in 2012 by the Model A which has 256MB RAM, one USB port. Raspberry Pi breaks new ground with a selling price of just $35 for the Model B, and $25 for the Model A. As a result the market opportunities in all areas of the world are huge as well as providing access to a wealth of literature and software, as well as a unique opportunity to start to learn coding and programming which has been created on a Fedora OS.