Ask HN: Looking for advice on manufacturing a physical product

One of my good friends (graduate student) is getting started as a consultant doing this kind of work. He is one of the smartest hardware guys I know. He would be more than willing to do the job for a low fee, also he is my roomate so I'm sure I can get you a YC discount :) Check my profile for an email.

For the size you are proposing, anything other than a few resistors is out of the question. Depending on the concept though, I have seen prototypes made on watch PCBs if they can work using an existing electronic design. The trade-off is as follows - a factory/development house can make the prototype for you IF you order the final product through them in sufficient quantities. If not - custom IC/PCB design plus casing for 100 units will cost around 50 000 USD (again - this really depends on complexity and function) And that is the china price. I live there. I do this for a living. Best place to feel your way is the Hong Kong Trade Development Council or the Productivity council. I mention these so that you can get some perspective. <a href="http://www.hkpc.org/html/eng/common/index.jsp" rel="nofollow">http://www.hkpc.org/html/eng/common/index.jsp</a>

Hire a small shop to do it for you. These guys do this sort of thing<p><a href="http://www.tieronedesign.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.tieronedesign.com/</a><p>Not cheap to do mind you and I'm not sure they do china manufacture but may do domestic.

<i>Has anyone done anything like this on an individual level? Is it even possible?</i><p>Of course! Google Mitch Altman and TV-be-gone. I imagine there are very many others too.

Of course it is possible! I've worked with several turnkey contract manufacturers in the US that would be happy to build 100 circuit boards. Some will even do PCB layout and help with circuit design. Mechanically, places like protomold and quickparts are a good source at low volumes, especially if you can hand them a CAD file of the enclosure design.<p>If you're looking for someone to help you out, go where those people hang out: places like sci.electronics.design on usenet, Circuit Cellar Ink forums (<a href="http://bbs.circuitcellar.com/phpbb/" rel="nofollow">http://bbs.circuitcellar.com/phpbb/</a>), Embedded.com forums (<a href="http://www.embedded.com/tigforums/index.jspa?categoryID=1" rel="nofollow">http://www.embedded.com/tigforums/index.jspa?categoryID=1</a>), and maybe even chat rooms like #edev.<p>If you're looking at less than 10k units, I doubt it's worth the effort to go off-shore.

Do you have a NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement)? That is absolutely essential to protect you from someone just taking your idea and running with it. With IP (Intellectual Property) Law, intent is a very important aspect, and an NDA signifies intent.<p>There are numerous free resources on the Web which can help you develop a workable NDA. If you email me at tjkeller@inebraska.com, I will reply with a copy of the NDA I developed for my product idea.<p>As regards the development of your prototype, given the informatyion you have provided, it is going to be expensive using commercial services to get such a prototype fabricated. This is because you don't have a designed and tested circuit from which the engineers can product printed circuit boards (PCBs) and finshed product from.<p>Email me, we can talk further.<p>Tom Keller aka: avrPhreaque tjkeller@inebraska.com

A few exploratory questions:<p><pre><code> * What is the nature of the electronic device? A PCB? A chip? One or several PCBs integrated with a case, batteries, buttons, etc (i.e. a finished end product or prototype of one)? * Do you need to outsource because you don't know how to put your design in a form industry-standard CAD tools can understand, or because you are not an electronics guy at all and need somebody to design the thing themselves? * What kind of volume do you need? 1 prototype, a small run of prototypes, a production run of an existing prototype? * Similar to #1: Is it electronics only, or do you also need molded plastic, machined metal parts, etc? </code></pre> In most cases, it is definitely possible given a little knowledge and a lot of tenacity for dealing with (sometimes several) small companies to get the job done.

I've never used them, but <a href="http://www.pad2pad.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.pad2pad.com/</a> always seemed like an interesting website. Download their application, design the board, and place an order.

Years ago I worked for a startup that built industrial printing machines (I did the touch screen control panel bit) but the guys sitting next to me we're working on circuit board design. We had our circuit boards pressed by an outside company. The guys were always getting one-offs of different designs made, usually for free as a "sample". If you have an idea of what chips you want, you might want to try phoning up a salesman at a reseller and asking about circuit board pressing too. If they don't do it, they probably know someone who does.

Kenton Oakes (lvpottery@yahoo.com) can help you get it done in China, he just spent 4 months there getting another product manufactured and learned a great deal from the experience.<p>Getting things done here in the States... just getting someone to take the job even with unlimited funds it is next to impossible.

Quite fortuitously, there was an article Friday in BusinessWeek on the subject: <a href="http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/oct2009/sb2009102_031287.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/oct2009/sb20091...</a>

I know a guy here in the States who would probably be glad to work up something for you at a reasonable price. My contact info is in my profile if you'd like me to put you in touch with him.