Monthly Archives: October 2011

Product Design .. 3 Mistakes That Can Cost You!

October 25 2011  |   leardonsolutions  |  All Posts, Product Design, Prototyping  |  Comment

Ever wonder how to make the world’s most expensive paperweight? Fall victim to these three common product design mistakes and you may get your chance to find out.

The product development process involves input from a variety of sources, all of which are equally important. In the early stages of the product development lifecycle, the look and feel of the product begins to take form with involvement from engineers, industrial designers, and product designers. What are the most common mistakes made during this early product design stage of product development?

• Industrial Designers and Engineers Don’t Talk

Product designers and engineers are key teams in the product development lifecycle that must collaborate efficiently in order to properly achieve the product goals of functionality, aesthetics, and human factors. When industrial designers and engineers collaborate effectively, the team has a good chance of meeting their time-to-market, functionality, and cost objectives. But when communication breaks down and the teams adapt a “throw it over the wall” mentality to just get the job done, the project can result in an over engineered paperweight.

 

This team synergy and cooperation is important across the entire process and includes everyone involved. When different firms are hired to perform the industrial design, engineering, and prototyping work, it is even more critical to properly manage the integrated teams.  If you have hired a manager, you should expect he or she to hire all external firms concurrently, set design and engineering objectives based on the product specifications, and hold design reviews with all stakeholders at the same table.

Typically, an efficient interaction between industrial design and engineering teams starts with each team providing the constraints that exist in order for each individual team to meet the product objectives. In this case, the engineering team would communicate the product architecture constraints and the product design team would communicate the design constraints. The two teams then evaluate each of the other team’s constraints and determine which can be accepted and which impact their objectives. An unbiased program manager is brought in to mediate any conflicting constraints by using the program priorities list (cost, schedule, features) as guidance to make decisions. This back and forth communication and conflict resolution is absolutely necessary for success.

• Rampant Creativity – Great for Picasso – Bad For You

Creativity is an integral part of product development but rampant, unfocused and unconstrained creativity can can be disasturous. Managing innovation and creativity is no easy task but the right manager can handle innovation and creativity and still accomidate realistic expectations that are in line with the program objectives.

It’s said that the product design determines 80% of the manufacturing costs. While this statement is debatable, it is a fact that the product design does have an impact on the product cost. In order to properly scope the product design and industrial design work, the product cost goals must be taken into consideration along with the aesthetic, human factors, and user interface goals.

If your budget is tight, it’s recommended that the needs of the engineering team are weighted more heavily than those needs of the industrial design team. This might sound like a ridiculous way of keeping within the budgetary constraints but is in fact the most practical. When the team is up against product cost or budget constraints it is best to have the engineers utilize the technologies that are less costly and easier to integrate, resulting in lower product cost and reduced product development spending. In situations where a larger product development budget is available, the product design team can influence and drive the technologies used by the engineering team.

• Ignoring Design for Manufacturing

Design for Manufacturing (DFM) is the method of preparing a product design for manufacturing by utilizing the rules and requirements for each of the fabrication technologies to be used. Proper DFM results in a product with higher quality, more repeatability, and lower cost. Here are some ways to be sure that the design for manufacturability is not ignored:

• Make manufacturing engineers a key part of the product development team.
• Do not wait until the product design is complete and approved before discussing DFM.
• Implement DFM into the design review discussions from the beginning of the project.

If you are interested in learning more about product design, please visit the following links:

Here are a few links if you are interested in learning more about product design:

Need more information? Please contact us with any questions or contact me directly at joseph.donoghue ( at ) leardon.com

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Product Development Efficiency – Tips and Tricks

October 18 2011  |   leardonsolutions  |  All Posts, Engineering, Product Design, Prototyping  |  Comment

Save Some Coin With The Right Product Development Team

Product Development is a process that when followed properly results in a tangible product that can be sold to customers, thus generating revenue and hopefully profit. In order to get quickly into the revenue stage, it is important to develop a  process that results in fast product time to market, high quality, and minimal development costs. In short, achieving Product Development Efficiency.  So how does a team go about achieving this? Below are three suggestions that if implemented will result in an efficient product development system.

Learn while minimizing cash spend

The product development lifecycle is essentially a learning process where the team progresses and continuously improves their level of knowledge about the product. During the progression, the team should be using the proof-of-concept, design, and production prototypes as the learning devices to determine the optimal function and failure modes under all operational conditions. Acceleration of this learning through a speedy design-build-test-fix cycle is absolutely necessary to get the team closer to the manufacturing stage and hence to revenue. Unfortunately, many small/medium and start-up companies do not have a never ending amount of cash to keep the learning progressing at a breakneck pace. Therefore, the teams need to be very smart about how they spend their money to properly continue learning and saving cash for later in the product development game.

Here are some great tips on how to spend the least amount of money and continue fast learning throughout the lifecycle:

• Pick The Right Team - Work with an engineering services company that has flexible billing arrangements such as amortization of engineering cost into product manufacturing or fixed total engineering costs. Avoid the hourly engineering rate which requires you hand over a blank check to an engineering services team.
• Do More With Less - Use the early proof-of-concept and design prototypes for as much qualification testing as possible. Many times, there is no need to use production parts off of expensive production tools for early qualification tests. Map out a test and qualification strategy that allows you to test as much as possible on early prototypes.
• Don’t Bite Off Too Much At Once – Once you enter into the production qualification phase, try not to lock up cash in expensive inventory by purchasing large quantities of your product. Work with a supplier who is happy to provide you with a smaller volume, say 1000 production products, that will allow you to test out the market prior to ordering more. This will also prevent expensive inventory reworks.

Continuity

Most entrepreneurial, start-up, or small/medium companies do not have large internal staffs to handle all stages of the product development life cycle. These companies typically nearsource or outsource much of the work in an attempt to minimize product development costs and maximize development speed. While nearsourcing and outsourcing can improve your costs and speed, it unfortunately can create a costly and slow system if not managed properly.

The One Stop Shop Could Be Your Answer: Many service providers and suppliers do not provide an end-to-end product development solution from product conceptualization to manufacturing, forcing companies to hire multiple service providers throughout the product development lifecycle. When companies piece together a product development team by hiring these outside firms, they sometimes create an inefficient system and lose sight of the tradeoffs between cost, schedule, and scope and the impact on the total quality solution. To create an efficient system, the company must minimize the number of hand-offs throughout the cycle by hiring an end-to-end engineering, prototype, and manufacturing firm that internally handles all the hands-offs without dropping or losing any of the knowledge gained in the last phase.

Here are some tips to improve continuity and product knowledge levels:

• Have one internal program manager for the complete project that responsible for product/project cost, schedule, and scope.
• Minimize the number of hand-offs required between program phases. Try to hire one company that can take the project from design concept to manufacturing.
• Eliminate any supplier agents, go-betweens, or representatives that don’t allow you to work directly with the supplier members doing the work.

Competent and Committed team

A successful product development team consists of internal members, service providers, and external supplier that are not only competent but also extremely committed to delivering the product to the market. Achieving the proper level of commitment and competency takes many years but if you focus on improving these two dimensions of a successful relationship, you can ensure an extremely productive relationship which will result in successful programs and projects.

In order to quickly assemble a committed and capable team, focus on the following:

• Make Friends: Develop a network of world-class service providers and suppliers that have experience working with the best product development companies. Assemble a team selected from this network based on your product development needs and requirements.
• Maintain an extremely close relationship with the internal and external team and create an environment with respect for people and their opinions. Provide open and honest communications regarding performance, both good and bad.
• Help your supplier improve their capabilities by helping them grow and develop with training and an active development plan.
• Expect co-accountability for the success of your product and don’t “point fingers.” A successful product will require teamwork and collaboration of all the members.

Here are a few other helpful links with tid bits of great information regarding lean manufacturing which greatly helps with product development efficiency:

Need more information? Please contact us with any questions or contact me directly at joseph.donoghue ( at ) leardon.com

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Prototype a Product ..What You Need To Know !

October 11 2011  |   Cliff  |  All Posts, Prototyping, San Diego  |  2 Comments

When it comes to prototyping your vision, it’s important to understand the process and educate yourself to save money and frustration.  Prototyping is usually the longest process in developing a product for market, so it is important to be realistic with your expectations and to understand the process. If this is your first time creating a prototype, consider these tips below.

Where To Start -

Unless your a CAD expert or graphic designer, just communicating your vision to your team and others is key to getting a great start on your product prototyping life cycle.

To keep costs down, use whatever you may have available to create a rough prototype so that others can better understand what it is your trying to achieve. Never underestimate your ability with a pair of scissors, some hot glue and scrap cardboard, wood or paper.

The benefits of going hands on with your industrial design is the ability to physically hold something, see it in 3 dimensions and discover basic flaws that won’t tie up resources and expensive development time.

Alternatively, you may be able to find an industrial design student at a local college, local handyman or crafty relative to help get your idea from your head to something you can hold.

 

When Is It Time To Call In The Pros?

Spending too much time trying to create the final product at the homebuilt proof of concept prototype stage can result in a lot of frustration. Often, creating multiple homebuilt prototypes to show different functions and designs can speed the process up and allow you to be more detailed about specifics. When you are satisfied that your home built prototype(s) meet your basic functionality, it’s time to find the right team to help take it to the next step.

What Is The Next Step In Prototyping?

Selecting the right team to help you build your prototype is one of, if not the most important step in your prototype development. There are thousands of service providers, I always recommend trying to work with someone local and that has been recommended. Communication is key, so spend some time with your development team and make sure you are all on the same page. An experienced team can make recommendations and offer up ideas on how to get you from A-Z on time and on budget. Alternatively, Using a site like www.thomasnet.com may help you find the right resources.

Creating a Design Prototype

This is where things really start to get exciting, your idea is literally just shy of becoming a real product. The design prototype looks, feels and operates the same as the final product, the only difference is the manufacturing process that’s geared towards low volumes. Avoid using rapid prototyping methods as these may add unnecessary costs.

The Design Prototype can be used to work out the final design and manufacturing details and to receive feedback from distributors, buyers, and retailers.

Things To Avoid

• There is usually no need to spend money on any production tooling in the proof-of-concept or design prototyping phases. Even if a production-like method must be used to produce a part in a prototype, the cost can be minimized by fabricating only what is absolutely necessary to make the parts.

• Only fabricate the quantity of prototypes sufficient to meet the needs of the team plus a small number of replacements. Do not fall victim to prototype companies that demand a minimum order quantity (MOQ) of prototypes.

Need more information? Please contact us with any questions or contact me directly at

joseph.donoghue ( at ) leardon.com

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5 Reasons Why San Diego Product Development Is Leaping Ahead

October 4 2011  |   leardonsolutions  |  All Posts, News, San Diego  |  2 Comments

San Diego Bay, Down Town San Diego, Old Town San Diego, Gas Lamp District San DiegoSince Leardon Solutions is headquartered in San Diego, California, it might be interesting to review what makes San Diego an innovative city. San Diego is the eighth largest city in the United States with 1.3 million people but to the local resident it feels like a vibrant, active, and cohesive small city community. This small-city feel along with other success factors unique to San Diego create a successful and innovative product development and product design culture. Below are five reasons why investors, inventors, startup companies, and entrepreneurs should keep their eye on San Diego product development.

1. Weather
San Diego is well known for its year round mild climate. Charts from weather.com show that the lowest average daily low temperature of 48 degrees Fahrenheit occurs in December while the highest average daily high temperate of 77 degrees Fahrenheit occurs in August. Some critics might think that this weather would deter from creative product design, industrial design, or innovative product development but in fact the opposite occurs. The active outdoor nature of San Diego inhabitants has spawned a large cluster of design companies in the action sports businesses. In fact, the business accelerator San Diego Sports Innovators was formed specifically to address the needs of the sports business community in Southern California.

2. Educated Entrepreneurial Residents
According to the LAEDC Kyser Center for Economic Research 2011 report, 40% of the San Diego’s adult population has a bachelor’s degree or higher. This educated work force makes San Diego a hub of research and innovation in biotechnology, communications, and software development and fosters superb product design and development. Aside from this, San Diego is home to some world renowned universities including the University of California – San Diego, San Diego State University, and the University of San Diego. In fact, the UCSD Jacobs School of Engineering is ranked the 14 best graduate engineering school in the United States by the U.S. News & World Report. For those aspiring entrepreneurs, the SDSU Entrepreneurial Management Center which is part of the highly ranked SDSU Entrepreneurship Program provides a link between university curriculum and industry hands-on experience.

3. World-Class Product Design Engineers
San Diego is home to many technology, aerospace, medical device, and life sciences companies that have created a pool of engineers well-trained in diverse markets and technologies. The list of well known companies includes Qualcomm, Broadcom, Hewlett Packard, Illumina, Gen-Probe, Care Fusion, General Atomics, Goodrich Aerostructures, and ViaSat Inc., among others. This large cluster of high technology companies requires local support through nearsourcing to local engineering and manufacturing service companies to help companies execute their product design and development strategies. This tier of service companies exists throughout San Diego County and is crucial for the rapid commercialization of technology. These engineering and manufacturing companies service both large and small customers where companies such as D&K Engineering, Outsource Manufacturing, Pharmatek, and Invetech serve the large customers and Leardon Solutions, PDGOncore, and Novo Engineering tend to serve the smaller customers.

4. Regional Manufacturing Base
There is a myth that manufacturing has left the United States and only exists in lower wage countries. Fortunately, this myth is untrue and San Diego product development, industrial design, and product design companies are in close proximity to one of the largest manufacturing bases in the United States. As written in the report Southern California is the nation’s largest manufacturing economy, if the six counties of Southern California (Los Angeles, Orange, Ventura, San Bernardino, San Diego, and Riverside) were a state, they would be considered the third largest manufacturing “state” with 765,000 people employed behind California and Texas.

Not all San Diego product development companies require this highly-skilled U.S. manufacturing labor force. Companies that design and produce products with high labor and assembly content might need access to lower labor wage countries. When low labor wages are needed along with fast manufacturing lead times, lower shipping costs, and low inventories, companies in San Diego have access to the plethora of maquiladoras factories directly over the Mexico border. Companies are also only one day travel time from the enormous manufacturing base located throughout Asia which makes it feasible to utilize strategic outsourcing models that match the product needs with the skills in the region.

5. Startup Support
A local ecosystem of innovative companies developing products can only exist if there is a continuous influx of new companies with groundbreaking new technologies. Without the proper support and assistance base, this ecosystem will not flourish. San Diego is home to CONNECT, one of the world’s best regional programs that connects inventors and entrepreneurs with the resources they need to commercialize their technology. CONNECT is a non-profit organization that originated in San Diego over 20 years ago and has helped in the creation of over 2,000 companies.

San Diego is also home to many technology incubators. One of the leading incubator programs in the San Diego region is EvoNexus, a technology incubator hosted by the leading non-profit technology trade organization CommNexus.

Finally, this local ecosystem requires professional societies that create a venue for companies to network and discuss best practices as well as helps to accelerate and promote the local companies. The local San Diego chapter of the Product Development and Management Association (PDMA) is very active in the local community and holds many PDMA events that bring the local business and product design community together. Also, the non-profit organization CleanTech San Diego exists to promote San Diego as a world leader is clean technology development and implementation. These incubators, professional, and outreach organizations are instrumental in promoting San Diego as a leader in product development.

The weather, educated residents, world renowned universities, world class product design engineers, regional manufacturing base, and startup support are fundamental to successful and innovative product development in San Diego. Startup companies, inventors, entrepreneurs, and investors should look to San Diego as a hub for their innovative efforts.

Joseph Donoghue – Leardon Solutions

 

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