A new design and development co-op agency will soon join the co-operative tech community in London.
The venture, InFact Digital, aims to work with charities, non-profits and businesses to provide digital answers to their organisational problems. It is a spin-off from Founders and Coders, a community of developers and a coding academy, also based in London.
“The concept of an agency coming out of Founders and Coders has been there for a while,” said developer Lucy King. One of the members of InFact, she first learnt about Founders and Coders while at university in Bristol, where she also joined a food co-op.
“The idea to form a co-op where we could have autonomy was the most important for us and also we were keen on a non-hierarchical mode of working and structure,” she added.
Rather than trying to get Founders and Coders graduates into co-ops as members, they decided to help them create their own digital co-ops.
At the moment, InFact is operating as a collective of freelancers and is receiving support from the Hive while it explores the best legal structure for the group.
Back in 2015 Founders and Coders, whose membership has an average age of 25, won the Young Co-operators Prize, receiving £2,000 in funding from Co-operatives UK to grow the scheme.
A founding member of the co-op, Dan Sofer decided to set up a coders’ academy after doing an online course to build up his own skills. In the 1990s he was also a member of a fruit and veg co-op based in Manchester. While that co-op has since folded, the experience helped him familiarise himself with the co-operative enterprise model.
In addition to its London campus, Founders and Coders runs a campus in Nazareth and one in Gaza, in partnership with Gaza Sky Geeks. They are also exploring the idea of opening a similar campus in the West Bank.
The idea behind the programme is to provide support at the beginning and then give each campus autonomy until it no longer needs the support of Founders and Coders. The Nazareth campus is led by a former graduate from the Founders and Coders’ London academy.
Operating in Gaza poses difficulties, says Mr Sofer, due to its precarious job market. Therefore, Founders and Coders aims to find remote work opportunities for graduates.
Anyone can apply to join the next London cohort, which begins in October. More than 180 students have graduated from Founders and Coders’ full-time programmes in London and Nazareth. Over the last two years, more than 90% of its graduates have gone on to work in software or a related field.
The fact that the 16-week course is free, helps to attract a diverse range of applicants, said Mr Sofer. Over 60% of students were women while a third came from minority backgrounds.
“The programme is free and provides support to people applying and we’ve been active reaching out to groups of people,” he added.
Applicants to the London programme have the option to study in Nazareth for 12 weeks before returning to the UK.
Each place on the Founders & Coders programme costs about £2,500 to provide. While candidates accepted on the programme do not have to pay student fees, they are expected to contribute back by facilitating the programme for the next cohort and consider seeking employment with one of Founders and Coders’ partners or make a regular voluntary contribution after they graduate.
“Everyone who comes to the programme can join as a member but have to attend the minimum meetings and people need to be active, we have to empower our members but that also means give them responsibility seriously,” said Mr Sofer. For now, only graduates from the London campus can join the co-op. “We haven’t yet got formal structure for incorporate members in overseas campuses involved into the structure,” he added.
Looking ahead, Founders and Coders is aiming to raise £20,000 for bursaries for students to be able to join the course in October as well as its Tech for Better programme.
Through Tech For Better, Founders and Coders matches organisations with a dedicated team of coders who will work pro bono with them to build a mobile web application for them that delivers positive social impact. A charitable foundation has already pledged £5,000 towards the cause.
“We are working on projects where there is a lot of interaction with clients, and spending time working tog with clients, we all really enjoy that. We’ll be thinking about defining ourselves in that way and getting a stronger sense of our identity and more stability,” said Ms King.
