How do you develop a product in a field you aren't an expert in (electronics)?

Reezer

Reezer

Reezer

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27 Oct 2002
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A few friends and I have noticed a gap in the market that we think could be filled by a fairly simple, cheap(ish) electronic device that currently does not exist.

I've done a bit of general google research but I'm finding it very hard to think what the first step is -

We can't specify the product in enough detail to get a fulfilment centre to finalise the design and make a prototype for us without some experimentation - there doesn't seem to be any specific data on controlling the range and direction of the wireless signal from the type of chips I think we need to use (similar to the radio device in the Nike+ foot pod but a bit more sophisticated.)

We can't do any experimentation without first having a "working" device; the radio chips come just as a chip - no board, no processor, no whatever-else-you-need-to-make-it-work, etc.

It seems like a chicken and egg situation - we don't have the knowledge to spec the product and we can't get the knowledge without having a prototype or a similar product to experiment with.

The option I'm currently looking at is a development kit that the manufacturer of the chips offers but we don't really want to spend £700 on something that may not be right for the task when you work out how to use it.

I'm a programmer by trade so I am pretty confident I could do the programming and experimentation once the basic prototype was assembled but unless someone told me which bits to buy and how to solder/breadboard them together I don't think I could produce the prototype.

We've also considered going on a course in electronics but it seems that we would need 6 months or more learning to get anywhere near the level that we could design an integrated circuit containing a radio chip.

Does anyone have any ideas on how we might progress this idea? A service that charges you to sit down with an expert in a given field for £x/hr and use them to develop your product (whilst retaining the intellectual property rights) would be ideal. One of the other guys spoke to the local university but they were told that the university would require a share of the intellectual property rights between 25 and 40% which seems like a lot for what would probably turn out to be an hour or two of someone’s time.

There are a load of other things we need to consider as well as the technical details and any advice from people who have done something similar would be much appreciated, but we think that without the prototype and experimental data the idea is a non-starter.

Thanks in advance
 
First, document the idea and post it to yourself recorded delivery. If you can't patent it yet, that should provide some sort of intellectual property proof.

Since you obviously need someone clued up on electronics, the only things you could do are to learn it yourself, or get somebody on board who already knows. It depends how big it'll be. A one-off payment for the course may pay off more than if you were to give a cut to another person, and it would be useful to know how your product works.
 
Difficult one. Your best trying to approach someone who you know that has a decent background in microelectronics. It might be the case that the technical specifications of the chip your thinking of using does exist but is only supplied to manufactuers of products incorporating it - in which case having a friend in the industry might well open some door to getting your hands on it.
 
Hi matey,

You need to speak to a concept designer who will listen to what your idea is and then get to work making a pcb that does this, they create the schematics etc which then go onto a pcb layout guy. After that your into manufacture and assembly of the pcbs.

I will have a word with my boss tomorrow to see if he is interested in having in this if you like?, we have all the contacts you require.

It wont be cheap to be honest, probably a few grand to get something up and running, depends how complex it is TBH

I'm a pcb CAM guy myself but know a few people in the industry :)
 
Thanks, D D Danneh, I have heard this before but hadn't actually considered doing it for some reason! I'll mention it to the guys tomorrow and try and get our idea down on paper.

Regarding hiring an expert: I guess this is the ideal solution as long as the cost is acceptable but I'm struggling to find someone with the right skills - I'm currently searching on intota.com and have found a couple of promising sounding experts but none of them appear to be an exact fit. I'll shortlist a couple of people and speak to my "partners" tomorrow and see how much they would be willing to spend upfront.

Learning how to do it myself is probably the most desirable option but the time it would take and the fact that success is by no means guaranteed might prevent us going down this route...
 
JAMAL said:
Hi matey,

You need to speak to a concept designer who will listen to what your idea is and then get to work making a pcb that does this, they create the schematics etc which then go onto a pcb layout guy. After that your into manufacture and assembly of the pcbs.

I will have a word with my boss tomorrow to see if he is interested in having in this if you like?, we have all the contacts you require.

It wont be cheap to be honest, probably a few grand to get something up and running, depends how complex it is TBH

I'm a pcb CAM guy myself but know a few people in the industry :)
Click to expand...

That sounds good except for the "couple of grand" part :( I suppose we should really do some proper market research before starting down this, expensive but high probability of success, route.

Previously our concept seemed fairly cheap to develop, I estimate the parts would come to under £100 to get one of each for a prototype but that is assuming we are able to get the expertise to put them together for free. If we go down the route of hiring an expert or a company to do the product development it's obviously going to cost more so we need to be 100% sure the device would be in demand before sinking our personal capital into it.
 
D D Danneh said:
First, document the idea and post it to yourself recorded delivery. If you can't patent it yet, that should provide some sort of intellectual property proof.

Since you obviously need someone clued up on electronics, the only things you could do are to learn it yourself, or get somebody on board who already knows. It depends how big it'll be. A one-off payment for the course may pay off more than if you were to give a cut to another person, and it would be useful to know how your product works.
Click to expand...

recorded delivery is not sufficient proof.
 
You could always just pay for an hour of a concept deisgners time just to see if its even possible? wouldn't cost more than £100 i guess :)
 
Reezer said:
Thanks, D D Danneh, I have heard this before but hadn't actually considered doing it for some reason! I'll mention it to the guys tomorrow and try and get our idea down on paper.
Click to expand...

Yep :) Just make sure to note down your names, the date, etc. Laminate it or something, as well. Post it to yourself, recorded delivery, and don't open it :)
 
If you're developing code for it I'm imagining some sort of DSP or Embedded type thing?

It may be worth coding the stuff anyway, you may be able to get it to run on an emulator even without the eval kit. :)
 
D D Danneh said:
First, document the idea and post it to yourself recorded delivery. If you can't patent it yet, that should provide some sort of intellectual property proof.
Click to expand...

Doing that won't prove anything or give you any form of ownership over the idea.

After all what is to stop me sending myself lots of unopened envelopes and sealing them with some ideas inside at a later date.
 
You need a prototype but as people have said you will need someone with the right skills to help you out. There are a few open source projects around that are aimed at creative people to help them develop things they don't have the skills to by making the technology more accessible.

The Arduino project is an open source electronics project that aims to make microprocessors (Atmel AVR) more accessible by providing a really easy to use development board at low cost (£15 or less) with excellent software support.

Processing is a related project (the Arduino programming software is based on it) which aims to provide an easy to use programming language for doing graphics, animation and interactions.
 
Ekim said:
Doing that won't prove anything or give you any form of ownership over the idea.

After all what is to stop me sending myself lots of unopened envelopes and sealing them with some ideas inside at a later date.
Click to expand...

Because if you need to use it to show proof, you will have dated the original document, and NOT have opened the envelope, UNTIL you produce it as evidence to support your case, at which time it's then verified that it's been un-opened since date of posting.
 
Confused said:
Because if you need to use it to show proof, you will have dated the original document, and NOT have opened the envelope, UNTIL you produce it as evidence to support your case, at which time it's then verified that it's been un-opened since date of posting.
Click to expand...

Yeah, but by sending my self a unsealed envelope I can keep it for a few years before finding something to document then popping in the envelope and sealing thus making it appear I have had the document sealed in the envelope for a number of years.
 
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