19/11/2025 –, Main Room
Open science hardware (OSH) offers a powerful yet underutilized strategy for building local innovation capacity, strengthening supply chains, and enabling cost-effective, context-relevant research tools. In an era of rising geopolitical uncertainty and economic precarity, OSH provides more than just accessible instrumentation—it forms the foundation of resilient, community-driven technological ecosystems.
This presentation draws on new evidence from the Open Science Shop project, a global network of local open science hardware vendors and manufacturers. Through a combination of network analysis and case studies associated with the Open Science Shop, we explore how open hardware projects create economic value—not only through tool deployment, but through skills development, local supplier engagement, and innovative design practices that adapt to regional constraints and needs.
We aim to show pathways for OSH projects to become nodes for distributed production and innovation, while identifying the most relevant challenges in practice. We expect to make the case that OSH should be seen not only as a technical or scientific asset but as a strategic tool for economic resilience, especially in under-resourced or peripheral regions. We conclude by proposing practical pathways for enabling local innovation ecosystems based on OSH, drawing from the Open Science Shop’s framework for global-local collaboration.
Open science hardware (OSH) offers a powerful yet underutilized strategy for building local innovation capacity, strengthening supply chains, and enabling cost-effective, context-relevant research tools. In an era of rising geopolitical uncertainty and economic precarity, OSH provides more than just accessible instrumentation — it forms the foundation of resilient, community-driven technological ecosystems.
This paper draws on new evidence from the Open Science Shop project, a global network of local open science hardware vendors and manufacturers. Through a combination of network analysis and case studies associated with the Open Science Shop, the paper explores how open hardware projects create economic value — not only through tool deployment, but through skills development, local supplier engagement, and innovative design practices that adapt to regional constraints and needs. The paper aims to show pathways for OSH projects to become nodes for distributed production and innovation, while identifying the most relevant challenges in practice. It makes the case that OSH should be seen not only as a technical or scientific asset but as a strategic tool for economic resilience, especially in under-resourced or peripheral regions. It also proposes practical pathways for enabling local innovation ecosystems based on OSH, drawing from the Open Science Shop’s framework for global-local collaboration.
Julieta Arancio is a social scientist based in Berlin, Germany, with a background in science and technology studies. She has been actively involved in the open science hardware movement since 2017 and currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Open Science Hardware Foundation. Julieta holds a PhD in STS from Argentina and has conducted postdoctoral research at Drexel University (USA) and the University of Bath (UK). Today, she works as a Senior Advisor at the Open Research Community Accelerator (USA) in the intersection of open science, open-source technologies and science policy. She is also involved in open source infrastructure for research assessment reform at the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (Germany).
Shannon Dosemagen (she/her) is an environmental health advocate with over two decades of experience at the intersection of open technology, science, and justice. She works to create systems that support community-led approaches to environmental and public health, particularly in fenceline and frontline communities. Shannon is the founder of Open Environmental Data Project, where she currently serves as Senior Fellow, and previously served as Executive Director from 2020 to 2024. She also co-founded Public Lab and the Gathering for Open Science Hardware.
Shannon has served on numerous boards, including the (U.S.) National Parks Conservation Association, Code for Science and Society, and the Open Science Hardware Foundation. She previously chaired the (U.S.) National Advisory Council on Environmental Policy and Technology and the Citizen Science Association. Recognized for her leadership, she is an Ashoka Fellow and has held fellowships with the Harvard Berkman Klein Center, Shuttleworth Foundation, and Rita Allen Foundation, among others.
I am a Senior Research Associate at the University of Cambridge and a Group Leader at the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB, Trieste, Italy) where I develop open technologies for engineering biology. I also research the potential for local, distributed biomanufacturing of enzymes to improve access to diagnostics and build capacity for biological research in the global South. I also co-founded four social enterprises and communities, working with collaborators in Africa, Latin America and beyond to build a open, sustainable and equitable global bioeconomy.