Open Bionics founder, Joel Gibbard, won a prestigious award last week at the British Engineering Excellence Awards.
The awards celebrate UK companies and individuals that have shown the skills, invention, and dedication to compete and succeed on an international stage within the engineering space.
Photo Credit: BEEAs
Joel was nominated for the Young Design Engineer of the Year award by a friend from his old employers, National Instruments (NI). NI played a huge supporting role in Joel's successful crowd-funding campaign for The Open Hand Project.
There were four young engineers short-listed for the award and the judges said it was the most 'tightly-fought' category.
Joel won the award for his low-cost 3D printed bionic hand innovation after lengthy deliberation from judges.
The judges said they were impressed by the open source nature of his work and that his design would hugely benefit many people.
Joel said: “I was lucky to have been nominated and feel even luckier to have won. The whole event inspired me to think of the future of engineering.
Advances in technology have the power to change lives for the better. It can be used for good on a huge scale and creative innovators are very much needed to push for this. Just think of the possibilities for future generations.”
Joel said he's keeping his trophy at home where he can keep an eye on it.
What the judges said of Joel: “A highly motivated, dedicated young engineer with multidisciplinary skills and an impressive record of achievement already.”