Status Updates From The Hardware Hacker: Advent...

The definition of open source used in and around the US is very different from what is used in places like China. The idea that intellectual property is secure is not something that is taken into account in China as there are ways for individuals to use what they’ve learned within their manufacturing job that can then be used to create new devices like bootleg phones for $12.

Production costs done out of country (for this case in China from the US) can have a large trade off in saving money but having the factories so far away an the inability to properly communicate with manufacturers makes this process tedious and tiresome. This is eye opening for the idea of getting a hardware startup up and going as there are so many moving parts and expenses.

With production engineering and developing any product the ability to collaborate with designers to take into account electrical and mechanical tolerance even when prototyping. The idea of designing for manufacturing if that’s what the goal is it helps to mitigate the need to redesign for testing purposes or if designs are not feasible for long term production. An interesting thought for sure.

Learning about PCB fabrication and the importance of a complete and descriptive BOM with third party manufacturing