How we built a hardware startup with two engineers and some free time

http://techcrunch.com/2016/04/01/hardware-is-hard-how-we-built-a-hardware-startup-with-two-engineers-and-some-free-time/

by jerryhuang100 • 10 years ago

93 14 10 years ago

techcrunch.com

Cheyana• 10 years ago

Fascinating. I used to do decades ago with my ears what their devices do now: Listen to machinery while walking around the plant I worked in to see if I could pick up on a trouble spot, because I learned over time that mechanical equipment that was heading for failure sounded a bit different then the equipment that was still running smoothly. Belts, bearings, rollers and plates would wear and I would know to pay more attention to them more often, rather than just react when something happened. People thought I was nuts when I told them I could hear that something didn't sound right through all the noise, which was considerable (you had to wear hearing protection all day).

extrapickles• 10 years ago

Some of the more fancy machines these days have embedded microphones to tell if a bearing is going to fail soon. They make a distinctive noise based on shaft rpm and bearing diameter when they start to fail, so you know which one to order before you spend a day tearing the machine appart to get at the faulty bearing.

studentrob2• 10 years ago

Wow that is cool. Thanks for sharing. From old school to high tech .. Love how the internet brings together experiences!

auxym• 10 years ago

Bearings also tend to start running quite hot when they are at the end of their lives. Bearings on trains often have smoke bombs on them that go off at a specific temperature.

voiper1• 10 years ago

It would be nice if they actually talked about their experience and creation, rather than just the methodology...

pepijndevos• 10 years ago

Inspiring. I've been walking around with the idea to build an amplifier of sorts, but have not talked to any customers.

Plans range from guitar headphone amps, to valve amps, to DAC things, to other crazy things.

FreedomToCreate• 10 years ago

As a hardware startup founder, I would like to note that the lean model only really works for hardware when you not creating something complex (ex lots of mechanical parts or lots of integrated electronic systems). In cases like that, the lean method completely falls apart because of the cost, and it becomes really important to make sure your calculations and simulations are correct.

studentrob2• 10 years ago

I'm sure it's true and I don't mean to diminish your comment but.. Isn't that kind of true for anything? Start small and build up.

You're not going to be a contender of, say, Apple in a year or even 10, but there are several companies in the pipeline already at more advanced stages

galfarragem• 10 years ago

In some complex and mature markets if you start too small you will never be able to compete with existent players. "Starting up in a garage" works mostly on new and undeveloped markets.

mmmBacon• 10 years ago

Agreed. There are some important other steps as well. It's a bad idea to sell unreliable junk. So having a sense of what kind of reliability testing you need is key. Reliability testing should start as soon as possible. This testing often can identify significant problems in the design or assembly that are difficult to model. Things like temperature cycling, damp heat, and high temperature storage at a minimum. Also a big piece of HW design is designing for the whole distribution of parts you might get not just the parts you have now. Will your design fail if you get parts that are at the limit of the data sheet specs? This is where the modeling @FreedomToCreate is talking about is key. Lastly, making sure you really understand the concept of yielded cost. If you get your yielded costs wrong you will be wrapping dollar bills around every product you ship. If your gross margin is below ~35% on a new design you should be worried.

homero• 10 years ago

Why would they build on Android then launch on iphone? ? I also can't find ruguscope

CarVac• 10 years ago

I too searched Ruguscope but then realized it's Auguscope.

How we built a hardware startup with two engineers and some free time

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