QualityInspection.org

Quality Assurance, Product Development, and Purchasing Strategies in China

Why New Product Development of Electronics Takes So Long

Over the years, we have been talking to people who are planning to or are in the process of, developing a new product. And there is a very serious mismatch between expectations and reality during the new product development process. So serious that people who are just starting on that path often cannot accept a realistic plan. Unrealistic expectations In their minds, there are only a few steps and a few success milestones. It looks a bit like this:   Harsh reality However, … [Read more...]

So, You Are an Inventor Looking for a Manufacturer? Think Again.

We are regularly contacted by self-described inventors who believe very hard in their product idea but do NOT want to manage that product’s development, production, and sale.  They are often smart people, brilliant even. But they tend not to be business savvy, and that leads many of them to make costly mistakes. This is especially true for electronic products and relatively complex mechanical products.   The million-dollar invention fallacy The truth is, the proportion of new … [Read more...]

Product Design Reliability Drives User Safety

I watched a nice video where the team from Blue Origin (Jeff Bezos' hobby and side business) explains how they designed their series of prototypes. It is a great example of validation of a totally new product that can have a catastrophic safety failure. You can watch it here: Some interesting takeaways: It is pretty clear that people can die if this product malfunctions. And, if there is one accident that results in deaths or near deaths, it will make their future customers … [Read more...]

How Bad Product Design Leads to Many Quality Issues

I had an interesting discussion a few days ago. It made me realize most people see products of obviously poor quality and think the issues come from manufacturing, while, in fact, they most often come from bad product design! Let's see why here... … [Read more...]

How good DFM and DFA Help with Production Cost & Quality

I have been reading 'the' reference textbook on the concepts of DFM and DFA (design for manufacturing and design for assembly). It's great for design engineers (especially on the mechanical side), for NPI program managers, and for anybody working on reliability, quality, or costing at the product design stage. People involved in manufacturing would also benefit from skimming through it. I picked 2 graphs that are quite interesting. … [Read more...]

NPI Cost vs. Production Unit Cost: What To Optimize For?

When developing a new electro-mechanical product, there is a tradeoff: Do you want to spend less time & money before production (during the NPI process), and suffer higher costs for each unit made? Or do you want to invest more before production, and enjoy lower unit costs? Here are some examples of where this tradeoff is evident. … [Read more...]

Exploring Product Development Agreements For Importers [Podcast]

In This Episode... We explore product development agreements that clarify your expectations, protect your IP, keep leverage over your supplier, provide you with transparency and control over your supply chain, and make it 100% clear who is responsible for what when working with a supplier on developing a new product that is going to be manufactured in China or other Asian countries.   Just hit the play button to start listening..! Listen to the episode right here 👇👇👇 🎧 Deep … [Read more...]

Exploring The Benefits Of Rapid Prototyping And Rapid Tooling [Podcast]

In This Episode... Renaud and Adrian talk about rapid prototyping and rapid tooling methods to make prototypes a lot faster than production tooling, with a focus on electromechanical products and plastic injection molding. You'll get answers to the following questions: What are rapid prototyping and rapid tooling? What do we discover from different rounds of prototyping? What are the features of hard tooling? What are the pros and cons of the different technologies used for rapid … [Read more...]

New Product: How Many Builds before Mass Production?

When a new product is made in a factory for the first time, there are always uncertainties. And going straight into a large production batch is risky. Many issues can cause that first batch to be a disaster, including: One of the materials/components is not up to standard, or some parts don't fit together as planned The operators, or the inspectors, haven't been trained and make mistakes Some of the operations can't be done as planned in a consistent manner Some of the … [Read more...]

Getting To Grips With Non-Recurring Engineering Costs (NRE) [Podcast]

In this episode of the podcast, we discuss Non-Recurring Engineering costs for manufacturers. As the name suggests, these costs are usually one-off and are what it takes to get your product into production. These costs are perhaps better known as R&D costs, and it's important to get to grips with them as they have a great impact on your product's sale price, as well as the feasibility of manufacturing it in the first place. It's fair to say that the NRE costs often turn out to be more … [Read more...]