Raspberry Pi now being made in the UK

 Thursday, September 06, 2012 3:02 PM GMT

Designed with the intention of stimulating the teaching of basic computer science in schools, the Raspberry Pi has to date been manufactured in China, where the Raspberry Pi Foundation was able to strike a better prices per unit deal.

“There was just no way to make the Raspberry Pi in the UK and keep the price at $25 for the Model A (which will be released before the end of the year at the promised price) and $35 for the Model B,” explained the Raspberry Pi Foundation’s Liz Upton.

“Happily, things change… Element14/Premier Farnell have made the decision to move the bulk of their Raspberry Pi manufacture to South Wales. The initial contract will see the Pencoed plant producing 30,000 Raspberry Pis a month, and creating around 30 new jobs.

“The Raspberry Pi is a British enterprise, and as well as improving things in the computing industry’s future here by educating kids, we wanted to improve things in the present too, by actually doing our manufacture here in the UK.”

Last November the UK Government committed to reforming ICT and computer science teaching in schools by introducing “a slimmed down, more focused, and more rigorous curriculum”.