Maker Spotlight: Marco Antonio Attisani

Energy & Sustainability Science
Maker Spotlight: Marco Antonio Attisani

Name: Marco Antonio Attisani
Home: Italy
Makerspace: Solar HUBs
Day Job: Watly Founder & Executive Officer

marco-a-attisani_watly_ceo

How’d you get started making? During my childhood, the very moment when I understood that dissembling existing things was the previous step to making new things.

Born in 1973, with a Bachelor Degree in Economics, an International Marketing MBA and an experience of over 15 years as a Sales & Marketing manager at international companies, I founded Watly in 2013 after a long recurring question over my life: WHY. There have many “whys” in my life, since I was a little boy born in Brazil and adopted by an Italian family. The biggest of my WHY was: why is our world mostly made of water and still most of world population does not have access to (clean) water? That’s where Watly started.

What type of maker would you classify yourself as? Transhumanist and Singularitarian, I am totally passionate about Artificial Intelligence, technology, robotics, futurism and renewable energy. I am working to create business models that could soon be implemented by AI.

I might not manage to change the world, but I’m positive that the world will save itself. It’s just a matter of time. I believe in a world of abundance for everybody and I believe in human beings more for what they can become than for what they are right now.

The Watly system
The Watly system

What’s your favorite thing you’ve made? A thermodynamic computer able to purify water from any source of contamination while supplying energy and connectivity at the same time: Watly. It is a mini service station that can provide these three fundamental resources to communities of up to 3,000 people. One Watly works as a standalone machine, but two or more Watly work as an Energy_Net bringing a totally new form of infrastructure that makes social and economic development possible to communities where water, energy, and connectivity are hard to find. It works entirely on solar energy and we aim to sell it to corporations, institutions or governments who can make it available to local communities and get cash out of it, as it is used by end users on a “pay-as-you-go” basis, thus providing an income to the Watly owners while bringing vital resources to local populations.

2-render-watly-3-0

What’s something you’d like to make next? Be a pioneer in the development of the Energy_Net: the internet of things that fuse together with water and electricity, which grasps the truly transformational potential of combining vital and basic resources into a self-supporting ecosystem. Energy_Net refers to a solar powered smart-grid behaving like the internet but where information technology fuses together with electricity and water. The Energy_Net is the real IoT that can be built where there is not Internet and where there are not things.

Any advice for people reading this? What you do can change the world for a moment, Why you do can change the world for ever. This is what I believe in.

mfr

You can visit us at Maker Faire Rome, where Watly will be unveiled for the first time globally. At our booth visitors will experience a Watly in simplified version but fully functioning and very much interactive. In a 300+ square meter space, three elements will be set up for a total length of 25 meters: two thermal engines — which collect solar energy and make it work — and the 12 meters widescreen central interface, which will create a very powerful user experience.

The interface will interact with the visitors and will show videos about the company, its technology evolution, and informative video graphics, while thanks to special RFID bracelets visitors will be able to receive drinkable water from the machine, working exactly as in real life. Moreover, at Maker Faire Rome it will be possible to live the “Watly Reality” for the first time: thanks to the Oculus technology, visitors (on a one by one basis) will be able to live an immersive 360° experience interacting with the machine in a spectacular context. During the Faire, the new exclusively designed W-tank will be presented. And then, gadgets for kids and grown-ups.

My team and I will be there to meet visitors and explain the project.

Who else should we profile? The Watly team.

team-watly

Where can people find you on the web? On our website, Facebook, and Twitter.


We highlight different makers from our broad community to show you the faces and stories behind the projects. Meet all the amazing people featured in Maker Spotlight. Want to nominate someone, maybe even yourself? Send a note with your responses to the bolded prompts above to makerspotlight@makermedia.com.

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Sophia is the managing editor of the Make: blog. When she’s not greasing editorial gears, she likes to run, ride, climb, and lift things, and make lo-tech goods like zines, desserts, and altered clothing. @sophiuhcamille

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