Ford is increasingly adopting strategies employed by manufacturers like Toyota to change the way innovation occurs from the traditional vertical to horizontal approach. See how Ford has engaged youth with the Fiesta Movement. Now, Ford is opening up its innovation process to the driver. For the latest youth trends in Auto check out our free report here

Amplify’d from www.prnewswire.com

Ford and TechShop, the world's first and largest membership-based do-it-yourself (DIY) workshops, announce a collaborative effort to open a communal work center in the Detroit area for individual inventors

Ford is the first automaker to matchup with TechShop, marking the latest move in a series of open-innovation initiatives led by Ford to empower the crowds to help create the next must-have automotive technologies and features

Technical leaders will discuss Ford's overarching vision for future automotive innovation and information exchange at the Detroit edition of the event that sparked the joint effort in the first place, Maker Faire, to be held in Dearborn at The Henry Ford, July 31-August 1

A membership-based open-access concept started in 2006, TechShop (www.techshop.ws) offers creative minds of all kinds affordable access to space, tools, and machinery so they can dream up, design and develop prototypes of their latest inventions. To date, TechShop has locations in California and North Carolina, with more than 800 total members.

Last spring, for example, Ford actively engaged consumers to submit, share and suggest ideas and technologies on the "Your Ideas" section of the Ford brand interactive consumer Web site, www.thefordstory.com. The pilot session generated some 3,600 submissions, giving consumers the ability to participate in a community-based setting where they could review and rate posted ideas and track what people thought about their own suggestions.

And, more recently, Ford announced the creation of a virtual community to engage software developers to innovate around SYNC. Interested developers can visit the SYNCmyride Web site (www.syncmyride.com/developer) and click to submit their innovative ideas, and sign up for the latest information and news about the upcoming SYNC application programming interface (API) and software development kit (SDK). Through July, nearly 800 app developers have signed up. Read more at www.prnewswire.com