Preface

The 2026 Greater Bay Area International Maker Summit & Maker Faire Shenzhen is rallying around OPC, creating an annual stage for Makers worldwide to push the boundaries of what one person can build.

Makers are no longer just hobbyists. They are becoming super individuals who fuse AI, hardware, and real-world scenarios into working systems.

That is why we launched OPC Pioneer Stories, a series spotlighting the people at the heart of this year’s stage of hyper-evolution and capturing the defining moments when one person becomes a team.

We are not just telling stories about making things. We are documenting the hardcore journeys of those who are literally and figuratively soldering technology into reality.

The call for OPCs has sounded, and the stories of the pioneers are already unfolding.

If you have an OPC moment worth documenting and sharing, we invite you to submit your story.

Scan the QR code and tell us about your journey.

Now, without further ado, meet this edition’s OPC pioneers:

The 2026 Greater Bay Area International Maker Summit & Maker Faire Shenzhen, rallying under the banner of OPC, has defined this year’s theme as the “Annual Hyper-Evolution Stage for Global Makers.”

One person can be a whole team — pulling AI out of the screen, soldering it into hardware, and throwing it into the real world.

Among the many OPC pioneers, here is someone who truly knows how to “play.”

On stage, the beat of electronic music pulses through the space. One robotic arm swings precisely to the melody; another improvises in response, driven by sensors — this is not a scene from a sci-fi film, but the “re:Embodiment” live performance by cross-disciplinary artist Snoww (Snow Wang).

In her performances, robots are no longer cold industrial equipment — they are “band members” co-creating with humans. And AI is not just code on a screen — it is a stage partner with a body, capable of sensing its environment and improvising.

From Electronic Music to Post-Human Performance

Snoww is a Chinese electronic artist, producer, singer, and live performer based in California. Her work spans electronic music, live hardware performance, sound installations, and emerging technologies, exploring the relationships between emotion, bodily movement, machines, and sound.

As the founder of Fake Gentle, The Hormones, and E-Motion Label, Snoww has long championed the cross-disciplinary fusion of electronic music, open technology, and experimental art. Her music blends Deep House, Chillwave, minimalist classical, and experimental electronics, creating immersive experiences that combine emotional depth with a futuristic feel.

But Snoww’s ambitions go far beyond music.

She treats the stage as a dynamic ecosystem co-constituted by humans, machines, and the environment — sound can be transformed into movement, movement can influence music, and machines become co-participants in the creative process. She calls this practice “Post-Human Performance Art.”

“When machines are no longer merely tools but become creative partners, how will art be redefined?” This is the question Snoww asks in every performance.

Snoww at a sharing session

re:Embodiment: When Robots Take the Stage

In the summer of 2026, Snoww became the first pioneering artist of Seeed Label (the label program), and a flagship case study of this model.

The core project of their collaboration is called “re:Embodiment” — a live “cyberband” performance composed of Snoww, a reBot robotic arm, and a Reachy Mini robot.

Behind it is a complete technical integration: reBot is no longer merely hardware, but has been transformed into an “instrument” that interfaces with the MIDI protocol. The robotic arm’s movements are driven in real time by music signals, while sensors feed the arm’s motion state back into the music system — forming a closed human-machine feedback loop.

This design embodies the “Human in the Loop” philosophy that Seeed has long advocated: AI and humans create together, rather than AI replacing humans. In Snoww’s performance, robots do more than execute commands — they participate in improvisation; AI does more than generate content — it becomes part of the performance itself.

“Every swing of the robotic arm has a rhythm,” Snoww shared in a workshop. “When you play it as an instrument, you discover that the robot has its own ‘touch.'”

Three Tour Stops, One New Possibility

In July 2026, “re:Embodiment” completed its summer tour across three core Maker events in North America:

Open Sauce (San Mateo, July 16–19) — performances and interactive experiences brought significant traffic to the booth;
Teardown (Portland, July 24–27) — the art performance became the closing highlight of the conference, with strong word-of-mouth;
Fab26 (Boston, July 27–31) — two pop-up performances sparked strong reactions at MIT and Artisan’s Asylum.

The results of the three performances exceeded expectations. Compared with traditional product spec displays, this “performance + interactive experience” format significantly increased user dwell time and depth of engagement. Large numbers of attendees queued up to try reBot, shifting from “reading specs” to “playing with the robot.”

Snoww at Fab26

At the reBot workshop at Fab26, participants controlled the robotic arm to the rhythm of the music — an exceptionally engaging experience. This validated reBot’s potential as an education platform: it is not just an industrial tool, but an entry point that lets people feel the appeal of physical AI.

And with her embodied-intelligence cyberband, Snoww became a music OPC.

The summer tour is just the beginning. In the future, her stage will appear at more music festivals, art museums, and cultural spaces.

When the robotic arm first swung to the beat on stage, everyone present may have realized: this is not just a performance, but a preview of the creativity of the future.

In that future, humans and machines are no longer in a user-and-tool relationship — they are partners in creation.

If you would like to share your OPC ideas and experiences at China’s largest maker innovation celebration—and demonstrate how AI can truly become part of our work and everyday lives while solving real-world problems—this is your opportunity.

Let your project be seen by more peers, developers, partners, and potential customers, and allow new ideas to meet and grow here.

Scan the QR code below or click “Read the Original Article” at the end of the post to apply. Together, let us step into the era of OPC creators and unlock the infinite possibilities of the future!

Greater Bay Area International Maker Summit & Maker Faire Shenzhen 2026

Global Call for Makers Now Open

Application period: June 30–October 30, 2026

Event dates: December 12–13, 2026

P.S. Companies that reserved a booth last year do not need to submit another application. More participation opportunities will be announced soon—stay tuned!

Over the past 13 years, the development trajectory of Maker Faire Shenzhen can be seen as a microcosm of the development of maker culture in China.

2012: “Gathering Small Wisdom, Journeying through the Great Future” – This was the first Mini Maker Faire in China, with less than 1000 attendees, and was more like a gathering within a small circle. But we saw the infinite possibilities emerging from the maker community.

2013: The slogan was absent, and the maker community was still small. – In the OCT Creative Park, there were cross-disciplinary exchanges among different creative communities, silently laying the foundation for cultural output.

2014: “Innovate with China” – the event was upgraded to the Featured level for the first time, with a significant increase in scale compared to previous years, and the beginning of professional independent forums. This year, makers began to enter the public’s view.

2015: “Everyone is a Maker, what are you waiting for?” – This year’s Shenzhen International Maker Week became one of the largest Maker Faires in the world. This year, the concept of “maker” was elevated to a national level, and the trend of “mass innovation, mass entrepreneurship” swept across the country.

2016: “My World, My Creation” – As the sub-venue of the National Innovation and Entrepreneurship Week, the event was held for the first time in the commercial center area, experiencing unpredictable weather from typhoons to scorching heat. Many makers succeeded in your entrepreneurial endeavors this year, but it seemed like there were even more failures. The hype around entrepreneurship shifted towards rationality.

2017: “Makers, Go Pro” – The event took place at the university campus for the first time, focusing on Maker Pros and providing a platform for diverse innovators and makers to showcase themselves, presenting more possibilities for the growth path of makers to the entire community.

2018: “Co-making in the City” – The main venue of Shenzhen International Maker Week, where individuals and groups with shared visions and values gathered to showcase stories, projects, and explorations of collaboration among different communities and people.

2019: ” To the Heart of Community, To the Cluster of Industry” – The event was upgraded to the Maker Faire Shenzhen, attempting to attract professional audiences and focusing on pragmatic aspects such as solving the needs of industrial upgrading and co-developin. It aims to build a platform for innovation and industry dialogue and collaboration.

2023: “Where Are The Makers?”– Starting from our own mission and values, we aim to explore the future direction of makers and theapossibilities for commercialization. Though this question does not have a definitive answer, we do hope that through this event, we can communicate and share with every one of you, finding more ideas and directions together.

2024: “Everything is AI” – This year, we brought together over 120 exhibitors from around the world, attracting nearly 1,500 professional attendees from nearly 20 countries and over 20 provinces across China. The exhibition showcased a wide range of AI application projects and hosted 10 AI hardware-themed satellite events, alongside various workshops.

2025: “AI Without Boundaries, Everything Reimagined”The summit brought together nearly 100 international innovation ambassadors and showcased almost 1,000 AI hardware projects.Technology leaders, pioneering makers, industry experts, and university teams from more than 30 countries gathered to create an international innovation event combining frontier thinking, technical exchange, and cross-disciplinary collaboration.