Urban manufacturers hardly collaborate. Fair enough. Who wants to share trade secrets after all? The Cities of Making project challenges this perception. Their findings indicate that exchange between urban manufacturers brings plenty of benefits. In this article, we explore why manufacturers do not collaborate, explain why they should, and show how they can.
Teamwork makes the dream work. This is certainly true for urban manufacturing. Companies can work together in various ways. They might, for instance, share:
- knowledge,
- products,
- material resources,
- services,
- facilities,
- storage,
- research,
- data,
- machinery.
Despite this variety of options, manufacturers hardly collaborate. The Cities of Making Case study report: London Borough of Haringey has shown that not even a quarter of companies questioned relied on or networked with others. How come?
Hurdles in the Way of Collaboration
There are four main barriers holding manufacturers back:
- Competition: businesses, especially those active in the same or similar fields, often see each other as competitors. This leads to defensive behaviour. Manufacturers refuse to share their knowledge and skills to protect their interests and retain customers.
- Logistics: if companies are scattered across various sites, collaboration becomes a logistical challenge – mainly due to additional transport costs.
- Lack of Innovation: manufacturers have their routine. Many don’t even consider changing their production process and hence don’t see the need to exchange with or learn from others.
- Lack of Shared Spaces: for collaboration to occur, makers need shared (informal) spaces, like cafés or canteens. If an industrial area lacks such spaces, networking is less likely to take place.
The Benefits of Collaboration
But why should manufacturers even collaborate?
For one thing, knowledge sharing brings environmental benefits. Some manufacturers have already figured out how to cut emissions and waste to reduce their ecological footprint. They can help other, more polluting companies to do the same. This would massively speed up the transition towards a greener manufacturing sector.
A waste contractor in Haringey explains: “I’m a firm believer in sharing the knowledge, I don’t understand why our industry doesn’t do it more – each of us are doing the same thing, although you might be doing it a little bit different. When I speak at events I share statistics, how we look after the environment, how we cut our emissions, and how we reduce accidents.” Another ecological plus: collaborating on a local level reduces the need for material inputs from far away countries and hence cuts transport emissions.
Exchange also drives innovation. If we bring together designers, manufacturers, and scientists from different fields, new ideas and synergies can emerge. Companies might start co-producing certain products. For instance, a clothing manufacturer could use their machinery to make sofa covers for a furniture manufacturer. Companies in the electronics and printing sector might share certain technologies. There is plenty of room for new overlaps. Outsourcing certain tasks to other businesses – instead of producing everything yourself – also saves a considerable amount of money.
Lastly, more collaboration would benefit the development of new businesses. Start-ups often struggle to overcome initial financial hurdles, like paying rent or acquiring machinery and tools. By working with already established companies and accessing their resources, start-ups might have an easier time getting the ball rolling. An added plus: new businesses always bring new, innovative ideas to the industry.
How Can Manufacturers Collaborate?
So, how can we bring urban manufacturers together? Drawing from the extensive material of Cities of Making, we have collated six ways to unite businesses.
Maker Spaces
Shared spaces facilitate collaboration. Unlike cafés and canteens, which are open to everyone, maker spaces are shared facilities provided specifically for urban manufacturers. They offer room for networking, sharing technology and machinery, training, and exchanging ideas. Maker spaces come in many different forms and shapes. Their main objective is to bring (small-scale) entrepreneurs together and facilitate collaboration. A well-known maker space is Machines Room in London.
Festivals
Make collaboration fun by organising a festival for makers. Such informal events allow manufacturers to chat and get to know each other. This can strengthen the sense of community among companies and may help build business-to-business relationships.
Guilds & Unions
Another way to strengthen bonds between manufacturers is establishing guilds or unions, like the East End Trades Guild. Together, companies have greater political power and can, e.g., lobby for more affordable industrial space, lower business rents, or the appointment of a Curator.
Online Platforms
Sometimes manufacturers fail to spot potential synergies. An online platform listing all industrial activities as well as the material inputs and outputs of an industrial area could aid collaboration. One company’s waste might be a key ingredient of another’s final product. Via the platform, manufacturers could easily reclaim materials from one another. The platform might also allow makers to exchange knowledge, discuss new ideas, or define common goals.
Clustering
Logistics sometimes hinder collaboration. Clustering companies with potential links can help overcome this hurdle. If similar businesses share a certain location, they can order and deliver materials together, share machinery, or co-produce items, decreasing both costs and their environmental impact.
Big Helps Small
The lack of networking between businesses makes it hard for start-ups to get the ball rolling. If already established companies agree to help, things may be easier. For instance, larger companies could rent out unused space to new businesses or let them use their machinery in exchange for a small fee. Start-ups can prototype ideas derived from research that larger, established companies can afford to carry out but are unwilling to take risks on. It is a win-win situation. The big players up their income while the small ones overcome initial financial hurdles. They both benefit from knowledge-gain.
Collaboration in a Nutshell
Urban manufacturers are hesitant to collaborate with one another. This roots in an instinct to protect trade secrets, a bad industrial layout (and logistic issues), and a lack of innovation and shared spaces. It is crucial to overcome these hurdles as collaboration offers plenty of benefits. It can speed up the transition towards a greener industrial sector, drive innovation, and facilitate the development of start-ups. This strengthens the local economy.
Luckily, collaboration can take place in many ways. Maker spaces, festivals, and guilds & unions bring manufacturers together and animate them to spot potential synergies. Online platforms and clustering similar businesses work well to overcome logistic hurdles and open up new options (reclaiming waste, co-producing items, etc.). Lastly, big manufacturers can lend a hand to small ones; both parties benefit financially. The opportunities to collaborate are there. Manufacturers now need to make use of them.
Note: This article is commissioned by and produced in collaboration with JPI Urban Europe, a European research and innovation hub founded in 2010. The original version of these articles can be found here.