Entrepreneur, 13, Gets Intel Funding for Low-cost Braille Printer

At just 12 years old, a San Jose, California middle-schooler received funding last month from Intel Capital, the company’s venture capital arm, for his prototype low-cost Braille printer.

Shubham Banerjee , now 13, used legos to create a science project that would slash the cost of $2000 braille printers so that families or schools could educate blind children at a fraction of that cost — using materials currently costing $350.

Through his new company, Braigo Labs, Inc., the youngster offers the printer’s software in Open Source code and makes the design readily available for public consumption free of charge, so that potentially millions of people worldwide can use it and improve it.

Intel was so impressed with the idea that they decided to invest to bring a consumer oriented braille printer  to market. The price point for Braigo 2.0 or its launch date cannot be disclosed, since development using Intel’s new Edison chip is still ongoing, but it has the capability of being used with batteries in remote locations of the world.

(READ the funding news from Reuters – WATCH a video and see the original story on GNN)

Story tip from Joel Arellano – Photo from Braigo Labs