Shanghai's own geek-easy

Huang spends over three hours per day on the weekend in XinCheJian working on his design.

"I wanted to make some useful items for myself and my friends in our daily life. The LED clock is the first thing that popped into my head," Huang says.

In a similar vein, Jonanthan Weinert from the US, a senior manager of business development in an automotive products company, has spent a year making a remote-controlled lock for an electric scooter.

The scooter would be able to be locked via an application on a smartphone and unable to be opened by anyone else.

"The idea has stayed in my mind for a long time after I noticed scooters getting stolen frequently in China, and I was lucky to find a place to make it," says Weinert, who has zero experience and knowledge in making electronics.

Weinert adds that he feels very proud of his first work as he tries to create an item with self-learning knowledge and support from the community by exchanging ideas with and taking advice from other members.

Unfortunately, Weinert has to leave China for a new job in the US very soon so his project will be put on ice.

"I've enjoyed spending leisure time in XinCheJian as a high-tech home, which made me feel much younger and let me try

exciting things with the help of other members," Weinert says.

XinCheJian holds a public opening night every Wednesday, hosting seminars and training courses including electronics, coding, robotics and more. It also serves as a funding and managing platform to support people to realize their own products and projects.

"Innovation is the driving force of open source while creators are the first step to innovation. With open source technology, markets will be dominated by niche markets and design, which will be the trend of the future," Li says.