男孩用乐高设计盲文打印机

In Silicon Valley, it's never too early to become an entrepreneur. Just ask 13-year-old Shubham Banerjee.

在硅谷，何时成为一个企业家都不嫌早。看看这个13岁的男孩舒布哈姆·班纳吉 The California eighth-grader has launched a company to develop low-cost machines to print Braille, the tactile writing system for the visually impaired. Tech giant Intel Corp. recently invested in his startup, Braigo Labs.

这位来自加利福尼亚的八年级男孩设立了一家公司来开发低成本的布莱叶盲文打印机。布莱叶盲文是为有视觉障碍的人提供的触觉书写系统。科技巨头英特尔近日也对这个男孩的创业公司Braigo Labs进行了投资。

Shubham built a Braille printer with a Lego robotics kit as a school science fair project last year after he asked his parents a simple question: How do blind people read? "Google it," they told him.

舒布哈姆曾经问他的爸爸妈妈盲人是怎么阅读的，他们回答是让他自己到谷歌上搜。后来，在学校去年的科学展项目中，他用乐高机器人做了一台盲文打印机。

Shubham then did some online research and was shocked to learn that Braille printers, also called embossers, cost at least $2,000 — too expensive for most blind readers, especially in developing countries.

再后来，舒布哈姆上网搜索并震惊地发现，又被称为压纹机的盲文打印机售价高达2000美元——对于多数盲人读者来说并不便宜，尤其在发展中国家。

"I just thought that price should not be there. I know that there is a simpler way to do this," said Shubham, who demonstrated how his printer works at the kitchen table where he spent many late nights building it with a Lego Mindstorms EV3 kit.

“我只是觉着价格不合理。而且我知道有种更简单的方法。”舒布哈姆说。他展示了他的打印机在厨房餐桌上是怎样工作的。他每天都在餐桌上熬到很晚，用乐高机器人EV3工具包制作出了这台机器。

Shubham wants to develop a desktop Braille printer that costs around $350 and weighs just a few pounds, compared with current models that can weigh more than 20 pounds. The machine could be used to print Braille reading materials on paper, using raised dots instead of ink, from a personal computer or electronic device.

舒布哈姆想做一款台式盲文打印机，售价大约350美元，比起现在二十几磅重的机器，他设计的机器只有几磅重。这台机器可以从个人电脑或其他电子设施上，用凸起的圆点代替墨将盲文阅读材料打印到纸上。

"My end goal would probably be having most of the blind people ... using my Braille printer," said Shubham, who lives in the Silicon Valley suburb of Santa Clara, just minutes away from Intel headquarters.

“我的最终目标大概是让大多数盲人……都用上我的盲文打印机。”舒布哈姆说。他家住在硅谷郊区的圣克拉拉，距离英特尔总部仅十分钟路程。

After the "Braigo" — a name that combines Braille and Lego — won numerous awards and enthusiastic support from the blind community, Banerjee started Braigo Labs last summer with an initial $35,000 investment from his dad.

“Braigo”这个名字是将“Braille”和“Lego”二者结合起来所得。“Braigo”获得了众多奖项以及来自盲人社区的热切支持，舒布哈姆去年夏天用来自父亲的35000美元投资款创建了Braigo实验室。

"We as parents started to get involved more, thinking that he's on to something and this innovation process has to continue," said his father, Niloy Banerjee, an engineer who works for Intel.

他的父亲尼利·班纳吉是英特尔的一名工程师。他说道：“考虑到他很投入这项工作，而且这种创新过程必须继续下去，我们做父母的也开始更多地参与。”

Shubham used the money to build a more sophisticated version of his Lego-based printer using an off-the-shelf desktop printer and a newly released Intel computer chip. The new model, Braigo 2.0, can translate electronic text into Braille before printing.

有了这笔钱，舒布哈姆利用一台闲置的台式打印机和英特尔新推出的电脑芯片制作了一台更复杂的盲文打印机。这款最新的Braigo 2.0可以在打印前将电子文档 Intel executives were so impressed with Shubham's printer that in November they invested an undisclosed sum in his startup. Intel officials believe he's the youngest entrepreneur to receive venture capital, money invested in exchange for a financial stake in the company.

英特尔的高管们对舒布哈姆的打印机印象十分深刻。十一月时他们投资了舒布哈姆的创业公司，投资总额未被披露。他们相信舒布哈姆是有史以来接受“以钱换股”风险投资的最年轻企业家。

"He's solving a real problem, and he wants to go off and disrupt an existing industry. And that's really what it's all about," said Edward Ross, director of Inventor Platforms at Intel.

“他解决了一项实际的问题，而且他想要有所改变，打破这个行业的现状，这才是关键。”英特尔的创作主管爱德华.罗斯 Braigo Labs is using the money to hire professional engineers and advisers to help design and build Braille printers based on Shubham's ideas.

Braigo实验室正用这笔资金招聘专业工程师和顾问，在舒布哈姆想法的基础上设计并制作盲文打印机。

The company aims to have a prototype ready for blind organizations to test this summer and have a Braigo printer on the market later this year, Niloy Banerjee said.

尼利·班纳吉表示，这家公司的目标是做出一台原型机，供盲人机构今夏测试，然后在今年晚些时候将盲文打印机推向市场。

Shubham is too young to be CEO of his own company, so his mother has taken the job, though she admits she wasn't too supportive when he started the project.

舒布哈姆还过于年幼，无法胜任公司的执行总监，于是他的妈妈担任了这一职。虽然妈妈承认舒布哈姆刚开始这个项目时她并不赞成。

"I'm really proud of Shubham. What he has thought, I think most adults should have thought about it," Malini Banerjee said. "And coming out of my 13-year-old, I do feel very proud."

“我真为舒布哈姆感到骄傲。他所想到的，大多成年人本应该想到才是。“舒布哈姆的妈妈马丽妮·班纳吉说。“而这个想法来自我13岁的儿子，这真的使我非常自豪。”

Vocabulary

entrepreneur：企业家

Braille：布莱叶盲文

startup：创业公司

sophisticated：复杂的