If you’re involved in a hardware start-up or early stage company, your development process will probably start with a physical prototype. You will show this to prospective customers and investors, gather feedback and make improvements, and eventually you’ll be ready to manufacture your product at volume. But how much will you actually know about the processes and steps required to make your product a reality?
For anyone trying to get a new product to market, not only is it a good practice to know in detail how your product will be manufactured, but this knowledge can also be invaluable when making pitches to investors or negotiating with potential contract manufacturers. Investors will be impressed that your overall knowledge extends to factors outside of your immediate product, and your ability to “talk the talk” will help potential vendors become more like strategic partners.
This is an example of just one of the lessons covered in the Build4Scale™ training, which was created to help companies optimize product designs, lower costs, anticipate risks, transition to scale-up, and ultimately get to market quickly and successfully. So if this type of insight seems valuable to you, and you’d like to learn more about FuzeHub’s Build4Scale™ offerings, consider registering for our next hands-on Product Manufacturing 101 workshop on January 29 in Kingston, NY.
FuzeHub, the statewide Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) center for New York State, offers workshops and webinars as part of a series in our Build4Scale program, which covers product development topics important to New York State manufacturers who want to learn more about commercializing their products.
Build4Scale™ is a registered trademark of the U.S. Department of Energy.
2 thoughts on “How to Refine Your Prototype for Manufacturing Scale-Up”
We are in the process of prototype development of a plant air purifier that removes most pollutants including VOCs and increases plant volatiles so a single plant can fill a room with germ killing plant volatiles and actually create fresh air. This unit is expected to sell for about $99 and should cost to manufacture in the mid thirties. A $450,000 NYSERTA and EPA study attests to its effectiveness.
Hi Martin. It sounds like you might be a good candidate for one of our upcoming Build4Scale Workshops. I encourage you to check out the agenda and descriptions of the various training modules to see if it’s a good fit at this time. Once you have a working prototype, this workshop will really help you to optimize your design and prepare for manufacturing at volume. Thanks for the comment!