Activities for all ages taking place during June. As always, check in advance with the organiser’s website for current details about start time, and whether there’s any charge or need to register.
International Festival for Business
Exhibition Centre Liverpool, 13 June – 1 July
IFB2016 is a global marketplace for creating connections and doing deals that promises to bring together thousands of businesses from around the world in Liverpool. Organisers estimate that the inaugural event in 2014 resulted in £280 million of trade and investment deals being done and hope 2016 will be even more successful. Delivered by Liverpool Vision in partnership with UK Trade & Investment, it’s a natural next step for UK businesses that want to grow or trade overseas and for international companies that want to expand in Britain.
Engineering the World: Ove Arup and the Philosophy of Total Design
Victoria & Albert Museum, London, 18 June – 6 November
This summer exhibition focuses on the design philosophy of Ove Arup (1895-1988), one of the most influential engineers of the 20th century and the pioneer of a multidisciplinary approach to design that has defined the way engineering is understood and practiced today. On display will be designs for some of Arup’s first projects such as Sydney Opera House and the Penguin Pool at London Zoo, alongside recent projects by Arup, the global engineering consultancy. The exhibition is part of the V&A’s 2016 Engineering Season which will also comprise a site-specific installation in the John Madejski Garden by engineer and architect Achim Menges and an associated programme of talks, workshops and events.
London, 20-26 June 2016
The week-long festival of live events throughout the UK’s capital celebrates London as a global powerhouse of tech innovation. There are opportunities for face to face networking, discovery and learning, all designed to create an inclusive and sustainable growth environment for organisations and social enterprises of all shapes and sizes. Law firm Moore Blatch will be offering free hour-long face-to-face law clinics for technology businesses http://www.mooreblatch.com/technology-law-clinics at its City of London office between 22-24 June to cover specific issues that tech firms face, from raising funding to dealing with regulations. Bookings must be made in advance.
25 June – 1 July 2016
UK robotics innovation is taking centre stage this summer, with a nationwide programme of exciting events for the first ever UK Robotics Week. Events for people of all ages are being held up and down the country, spanning public lectures, open labs, schools and academic competitions, hackathons, tech weekends for children, and cutting-edge robotics showcases. As well as four competitions – School Robot Challenge, Autonomous Driving Challenge, Surgical Robot Challenge and Field Robotics Challenge – there are public lectures and three major conferences that will attract researchers from around the world. Events culminate in an International Showcase in London on Friday 1 July bringing together the latest research from the UK and from around the world with talks and demonstrations.
Fathers’ Day at Bletchley Park
Bletchley Park, 19 June
The home of wartime codebreaking is putting on some special events for Fathers’ Day this year, including the launch of its own Station X beer, created by The Concrete Cow Brewery in Milton Keynes at a traditional barbecue with music from swing band the Bevin Boys. Enter through admissions as usual then head to one of the food outlets on site to buy a voucher for the barbecue voucher, which will be on the main lawn where the Codebreakers spent their free moments during the war. Food will be served between midday and 2pm with Station X beer available in the Hut 4 Restaurant and shop.
Educational robotics hackathon
Imperial College, London, 3-19 June
Design a prototype educational robot for use in schools and homes at this two-week event organised by the IET’s Robotics & Mechatronics TPN. Starting from scratch or building on an existing design, the challenge is to ‘add value’ towards the educational goal. The fortnight starts with a kick-off meeting on Friday 3 June and ends with a final concentrated weekend of work with all teams getting together in a shared hackspace 18-19 June. The time in between can be spent working in your own home/space, there will also be space available at Imperial College Advanced Hackspace for those that are local to London. Team presentations and prizes will be given on Sunday 19 June. Each team will be given an amount of money to buy parts and there will be other useful ‘bits’ available. Access to 3D printers and a laser cutter will also be available.
Cheltenham, 7 – 12 June
How long is a piece of string? What makes the world turn? And why does chocolate taste so good? From the state of the planet, to the latest stem cell research, to the secrets of the perfect cup of tea – nothing is off limits at The Times Cheltenham Science Festival. With past speakers including Brian Cox, Robert Winston, Alice Roberts and Richard Dawkins, the festival is the perfect place to pose your most burning questions and expand your mind over six of debate, discovery, experiments, enjoyment and hands on fun and take a fresh loo
SpiNNaker and the Human Brain Project Lecture
Manchester Conference Centre, 15 June
Professor Steve Furber, an IET Fellow and ICL Professor of Computer Engineering in the University of Manchester’s School of Computer Science, will describe the latest developments in research aimed at building a machine that can mimic the biological structure and behaviour of the human brain in this lecture hosted by the IET’s NW:Manchester local network. SpiNNaker is a massively-parallel computer system, ultimately to incorporate a million ARM processor cores (the largest machine to date has 500,000 cores) with an innovative lightweight packet-switched communications fabric capable of supporting typical biological connectivity patterns in biological real time, and it is now openly available under the auspices of the Human Brain Project. Its goal is both to contribute to the scientific quest to understand information processing in the brain and also to understand how that knowledge may be used to build more advanced cognitive computing systems.
Children’s Engineering Lecture: What Makes Software Go Wrong?
Imperial College, London, 21 June
This afternoon Children’s Engineering Lecture, sponsored by the Transport Trust, is part of a new annual series run by Imperial’s Outreach Office in conjunction with the Faculty of Engineering. Researcher and lecturer Alastair Donaldson will give, through live programming demos, some insight into what it means to be a programmer who builds a software system, and will use this insight to illustrate the pitfalls of software development that lead to software failures. He will also talk about how software developers can fight back against the sources of software failure, using testing and verification techniques.
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