How to move your product design from sketch, prototype stage to manufacturing stage
In a real life scenario, if you come up with a new product design idea that you believe has value and you have proved that concept to target markets by performing feasibility testing and other means. How would you move this sketch or quick prototype to actual manufacturing.
1) Do you learn Solidworks or other CAD tools to build a model of the design
2) Where does the materials/engineering knowledge would come in the picture and how do I as a designer cope up with lack of proper engineering skills
3) Who do you contact it to get it manufactured
Please offer your suggestions on my dilemma about product design
Answers (12)
Rob C.
Product design and research director, consultant and educator. 1,000 projects in 5 continents for world's leading brands
Best Answers in: Industrial Design (2), Product Design (2), Advertising (1), Graphic Design (1), Change Management (1), Manufacturing (1)
Arpit,
If you will be doing ongoing product development you should learn to use an engineering program such as solidworks. The particular program you learn should relate to the types of products that you may be working on. Solidworks is best for products with realtively simple surfacing. It is not good at complex surfacing such as you may find on a car body or some types of consumer products. Designers oftern use more than one 3d program to develop a product.
Materials and engineering knowledge is important in developing a product. The best choice of material or process is related to the volumes being manufactured, to your favored vendors, their strengths and weaknesses and to many other factors. I would reccomend doing course at a reputable industrial design school as this knowwlege is important in developing successful prooducts and takes several years to learn under qualified instructors.
To obtain manufacturing quotes we maintain an ongoing database of hundreds of reliable manufacturers. They should have long experience with the intended materials and processes and quote competitively.
Working with East Asian manufacturers successfully requires an understanding of cross cultural issues.
Product development requires deep knowlege and experience. It is dangerous to attempt it without having completed a good 3 or 4 year course. To develop very successful products in global markets probably requires as much knowledge as does the practice of medicine.
A company in the United States will invest tend dollars in tooling and manufacturing set up and one hundred dollars in marketing distributing and adverting for every dollar it costs to design a product so it is unwise to cut corners in design otherwise this further investment will not be an investment but instead wasted money.
Links:
Given that you don't have engineering, materials or manufacturing skills, I think the answer is to figure out how you can hire the appropriate resources for the next stage of development.
There are a number of different options. One is to work with a consulting product design firm. On the high-end are IDEO, Lunar and Frog Design. These firms can provide an end-to-end solution for your product, but you will likely pay top dollar for the work.
Alternately, you can hire industrial designers and engineers on an individual basis, acting as the "general contractor" for the stages of development. This requires excellent project management skills on your part, and it may be hard for you to assess the expertise of these individuals from the outset. However, if you find experienced industrial designers or product engineers who have designed products similar to yours, they can often provide an end-to-end view of the steps to manufacturing.
Many manufacturers offer in-house deign and engineering services as a "perk" to generate manufacturing business (and assure that designs align with their manufacturing capabilities). Most of these firms are in Asia, which can bring its own set of challenges, but it might be worth exploring through local brokers. Locally, you might want to talk to Flextronics. They are a contract manufacturing firm, but they just bought Frog Design.
In general, meeting with as many design and manufacturing firms as possible will be great for your own learning curve. Create a list of very specific questions about every stage of the process, the deliverables, the costs and containment, etc. and use the meetings to improve your understanding of what is involved.
I've added links below to a directory of product development firms, and to the Worrell site which has some overview articles and questionnaires you might find helpful.
Good luck!
Links:
Arpit,
You have a good question here.
Initially you capture Voice of consumer, and accordingly a designer team will work to get a product which suits the appearance and ergonomic demands of the consumer. The specs are derived from VOC.
There has to be constant interaction in between designer and an engineering team, once an designer gets the concept in to a 3D model, then engineering team needs to scope it for feasibility, prototyping, etc. Provided the target consumer and market is taken in to consideration.
Once the concept comes to engineering team, a rapid prototype can be developed, also the engg. team needs to evaluate various aspects such as cost, material, strength requirement per specs.
Then it will be revied by cross functional teams (Marketing, sales, engineering, design, manufacturiing and finance).
Once found suitable then only it can be taken further.
And I guess by now you must have got answers for most of your questions...Please let me know if you have any further queries.
I am working on Engineering side of the product development.
All the best......
Aripit,
SolidWorks is a great program that allows for versatility in designing/developing products. If your product has minimal piece parts (say less than 50) then it should be an adequate choice.
If you're looking for a process for product development, then I would recommend the 6-sigma approach. It provides an abundance of tools for product development and can focus your efforts based upon customer needs. It can minimize the the "start-up" headaches (costs and delays).
I would also suggest a Manufacturing Representative. They are typically experienced in understanding product designs and can recommend suppliers that can best manufacture components.
There are numerous product development contractors who can provide the engineering expertise, but it is best to have a several full time in-house experts to coordinate the development cycle.
Regards,
Gordon S.
Strategic Physicist at DSER Strategy Group
Best Answers in: Graphic Design (1), Engineering (1)
I would agree with most of what's been said here, but would add that money is also a key factor. If you have the time to learn SolidWorks (and that is a multithousand dollar investment), you probably will have the clearest thought-to-drawing progression, because the object exists in your mind. If you're tight on operating funds, it may be more productive to develop the idea yourself and create a rough proof-of-concept to allow you to attract investors before taking it elsewhere for more refinement.
Since you mention that you have limited engineering skills and imply that you'd need to learn SolidWorks, I'd go with a Product Design firm. Such firms will not only have the appropriate resources to discuss your idea and develop the drawings, they also will have the engineering background to ensure that it will survive the demands you wish to place upon it.
Manufacturing is often a different story. Depending on the type of article, your design firm may be able to put you in contact with a variety of manufacturing firms, or do limited production in-house. Before this point, though, I would think that a six-sigma approach would have reduced (but not irrelevant) importance. For us, we tend to think about what the product needs to do first, and then apply what needs to be changed to make it manufacturable. Reversing that logic can cause you to shave features prematurely.
As an example, the firm I work at tends to focus on prototypical development and limited-run manufacturing. We draw from a wide variety of disciplines (physics, engineering, composites, aerospace, fabrication, etc.) in developing concepts our clients bring. We've taken ideas that are fully developed and created a build-to-print prototype, have taken ideas and refined them or suggested additional work that needs doing before bringing us on board, and gone from a simple one-sentence product goal to a fully-integrated system. After initial prototyping, we have a variety of injection-molded plastic, composite laminates, and metallic structure partners that we have recommended to clients. We are also developing overseas manufacturing plants for large-scale production of composite-built products.
Links:
Pierre P.
Industrial Designer, President Parallaxe Inc.
Best Answers in: Product Design (2), Change Management (1), Manufacturing (1)
I agree with the approach proposed by Christina. Since you don't seems to have the technical skills, you need to find a good team, hired in-house or in an outside product development firm.
As Gordon as also added, finding the money to take the project to sucess is of great importance. Many times I have seen great projects end because the money stopped flowing.
I would like to add to these that don't underestimate the marketing and sales aspects. Engineering and product design people love to design but at one point this must end and money must come in. So the stick must be passed on to sales and marketing.
Good luck!
I also agree with the other respondents regarding software, and the approach suggested by Christina, however I would suggest that you start out initially with a local manufacturing facility that allows you to perform a smaller run of products before taking your design to a large run firm such as Flextronics.
Even though a design has been proven through testing, unless you are already well versed in market analysis, it is a good idea to gain additional market feedback through trade shows and select small market sales.
Once you have a good idea of your potential annual usage, you should then begin discussions with larger contract manufacturers who offer design services such as mass production optimization and component purchasing. This strategy will not only help you know your potential market size, but will also help you gain brand name recognition of your product prior to discussions with overseas manufacturers. You will be in a much better bargaining position.
My firm is the North American arm of a mid to large run contract manufacturer in southeast Asia, and this is a strategy which has worked well for our customers in the past.
Links:
Matthew Ian L.
New Product Development Leader, Übernetworker, Professor, LEGO Nerd, Dakar Dreamer, R32 Driver; Powered by Caffeine
Best Answers in: Software Development (1)
New designs simply must be modeled in 3D CAD. There simply is no reason not to do so. There are so many additional benefits as well (I can elaborate, but let's just take it is a given).
If you are not an expert in product development, materials, manufacturing processes etc. there are basically two routes: hire experts (like Michael Czysz did to create MotoCzysz) or partner with an engineering consultancy. A good engineering consultancy will also be able to help forge the relationships to carry the product through to manufacture. With this approach you are creating a virtual corporation. This will lead to greater efficiencies (you are not using precious time and resources on training, recruiting, creating and maintaining engineering standards, software selection, etc.) and allowing you to concentrate on shepherding your ideas from concept to reality.
I hope this helps.
Hi Arpit,
This is a way you could proceed.
You would build the design in a program such as Solidworks or Pro/Engineer. This is a first step in generating drawings and models to give to vendors to get quotes. It is also a way to do some design testing and validation. You can check motion, interference and perform other engineering analysis, before spending the money on real parts. You could learn the skills or hire a consultant to do this for you.
Once you are comfortable with the design, you can get a prototype made. You can easily send your 3D model to get a made with 3D printing technology. This can be cheaper than sending it to a machine shop, but there are limitations to the technology, such as material choice and some features may not come out as well because of resolution. But, it provides you with something physical to have to do further testing. You can access resources in SoildWorks to get quotes once your part is modelled.
You would eventually need to consider how you want to proceed with the manufacturing. For smaller quantities it generally is cheaper to have the parts machined, because of the cost of the mold. But, as the quantity increases then having the parts molded would become more feasible. Molded parts need to be designed different from machined parts, so you may need to make a decision that it will be a molded part upfront or need to do a redesign later on. You also consider material choice when considering molding or machining.
Lori H.
Business Development at Function Engineering
Best Answers in: Business Development (1), Market Research and Definition (1), Industrial Design (1), Business Plans (1)
Hi Arpit:
This process is not for the faint of heart. Use the idea, market feedback, and feasibility test results to write a business plan. The US Small Business Administration has an excellent Web site to help understand how to do this and how to approach getting funding for the effort if a sizable trust fund is not available.
If you have a design prototype, how to proceed depends in part upon how complex your product idea is and how the industry you're selling into works. For example, most toy designs are actually licensed to the large toy manufacturers. This mechanism is well developed, and it allows teams with great ideas (but few resources) to get them to market without sinking the mega-bucks for development and marketing.
If you are making something like consumer electronics, on the other hand, you'll need help. Hire a product design firm or experienced individual designers and engineers. Experienced. Really. In addition to the big firms that other responders mentioned, there are a host of companies that know how to get things made. And with all due respect to the genuinely respectable people who have responded otherwise, I sincerely doubt that a lay person could fire up Solidworks (or Pro/E!) and crank out a design that is actually manufacturable. Sorry to have reality enter here.
Experienced product design engineers are generally up to speed on everything from how to pick a material to get the look/robustness/properties you want, to how to design for UL, CE, FCC, and other regulatory requirements, to how to select and interact with Asian (or other) manufacturers to achieve the intended result. They know about things like how certain electrical design issues have lots of interesting implications for mechanical design and industrial design. They even can help guide on packaging and fulfillment, maybe even introductions to channel partners.
In contrast to some other responders, I actually see industrial design education as distinctly different from that of the product design engineers who turn the ID into files for manufacturing. Great products have great industrial design and equally talented product design engineers involved. They have different backgrounds, focus, training and experience.
Even for experienced ID/PD people, after the intial CAD database, most products go through multiple rounds of design validation builds and engineering validation builds, with tweak upon tweak to get it right.The best product designs are tuned overa period of months. This could involve some level of industrial design, mechanical engineer, electrical engineer, firmware, software, as well as the manufacturing team.
So finally on marketing: The main reason why products fail is not because they weren't a good idea -- sadly though even good ideas are a dime a dozen. It's not because they were poorly designed and engineered -- although many do fail for this reason. It's not because of bad luck -- although you need good luck on your side. It's because people with good ideas see having the product made as the end of the process. This is only the beginning. Even good ideas made by great designers and engineers and well managed contract manufacturers don't succeed if stores don't carry them and people don't buy them. No channel to sell into, no funds for marketing, no connections for exposing people to your product, in other words, marketing neglect is the number one mistake people who "have a good idea" make. People believe that somehow brilliant ideas will sell themselves.
Kindly,
Lori H.
Michael L.
Project Engineer , Effective Professional Solutions LLC
Best Answers in: Using LinkedIn (1)
Arpit,
I agree with Rob. Especially with his words about Knowledge of Materials and Engineering. I have a comprehensive experience in manufacturing related to wide variety of products, materials, engineering processes. In other words, the knowledge of manufacturing technology is the most important part of successful product design. In order to select effective engineering process you have to apply Design for Manufacturing (DFM) principles. Supplier selection process is based on DFM, Cost Estimation Analysis and their combination. First, I would like to help you with some published sources on manufacturing principles, value engineering, DFM and cost estimation for practitioners.
Click here: http://theconsultantcorner.com/html/books.html
Please let me know if you have more questions.
Links:
Hi,
If you decide to go down the consultancy route, you need to make sure that you have any third party sign an NDA (non disclosure agreement). This will have to be created by yourself, but I'm confident that there will be templates available on the www.
Good luck with whatever route you choose, but if you lack the experience to develop your product yourself, you could try and sell the idea to a company who deals with similar products.
Murray
