Eben Upton, the founder and CEO of Raspberry Pi, has been recognised for his contribution to STEM alongside 12 other winners at the 2022 Wales STEM Awards.
The founder of the charity, which has sold almost 50 million of the small single-board computers that it produces worldwide, was announced as the winner of the Outstanding Contribution to STEM award.
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The awards ceremony, which took place at Cardiff’s Mercure Hotel, recognised the innovative STEM work that’s being undertaken in Wales, addressing the diversity gap and skills shortage, and inspiring and raising the aspirations of the next generation.
‘I’m delighted to accept the Outstanding Contribution to STEM award on behalf of everyone here at Raspberry Pi and the wider Raspberry Pi community,’ Upton said. ‘We set up Raspberry Pi back in 2008 to try and rekindle the enthusiasm for computer programming that I, and many of my friends, had back in the 1980s. As a child, I had a beige box on my desk in my bedroom and that was a BBC Micro Computer. Like Raspberry Pi, it was designed here in Cambridge and it was manufactured in south Wales.
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‘In the decade since we launched our first Raspberry Pi computer, a device that we had imagined in our wildest dreams might sell 10,000 units, it has gone onto sell nearly 50 million units not just in the UK, but around the world and we are seeing compelling evidence that the renaissance in interest in computing and STEM subjects that we had hoped for is beginning to happen,’ he continued. ‘So as we enter our second decade, we are hoping to make a lot more computers in south Wales and I’m hoping to get a lot more children around the world excited in computers.’
‘We would like to offer a huge congratulations to all of the winners of this year’s Wales STEM Awards,’ said head judge Louise Bright, founder of the Wales Women in STEM network. ‘The winners represent some of the most progressive organisations and individuals at the forefront of STEM innovation in Wales. The calibre of the businesses and individuals shortlisted for the awards was second to none and I’d like to congratulate all the finalists. The awards show that the future of the STEM sector in Wales is bright and we look forward to the industry going from strength to strength.’
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The full list of winners can be found here.