Referring to your initial thoughts section, if you go down the route of (a), you should definitely secure a provisional patent before speaking to bigger companies. This is fairly easy and cheap (<$200 IIRC), and although the lawyers will all say you need one, you can get away without because literally the only purpose of this provisional patent is to say "I've got a provisional patent on this" to the big companies. If they want to steal your idea they'll find a way to do so regardless of how good your lawyers are, so just throw the smallest, cheapest hurdle you can find into their path. There's a good book by Steven Key called "One Simple Idea" that discusses many of the nuances of licensing ideas to bigger companies, but the main points are: yes it does happen, it's not even that uncommon, and you can do it too because it's not even all that complicated, *but* you should probably have tens of ideas because ... reasons.
If you go down the route of (b) and have no experience in product design, you should find a Contract Manufacturer <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_manufacturer> to design, produce, and even sell it for you based on your spec and prototype. You pay for this privilege. There are product design firms in Australia that can do some or all of this for you, again at a cost. And a disclaimer here: I currently work for Planet Innovation <http://www.planetinnovation.com.au> in Melbourne, which does this stuff. We have plenty of competitors too; Grey Innovation, Invetec, Black Magic, etc. And as a VERY rough ballpark figure, you need at least a 3X multiple of your cost of goods as your retail price to make a 5% margin. If you license to a bigger fish they'll offer *at best* 2% of revenues, so if your product retails for $500 they need to sell 10 000 for you to make $100k. Is that worth it? Who knows. Hardware is hard. Tom P.S. http://makezine.com/2012/04/30/makes-exclusive-interview-with-andrew-bunnie-huang-the-end-of-chumby-new-adventures/ is a great interview with Andrew Huang who made the Chumby. Very honest and refreshing read about his experiences in this area. I haven't read it yet, but https://theblueprint.com/stories/andrew-huang/ is a more recent interview with the same guy that I found while trying to dig up the first one. Tom Allen t...@jugglethis.net +61 412 335 425 http://www.drtomallen.com On 28 November 2014 at 10:56, Aaron Christiansen < aaron.christian...@gmail.com> wrote: > Apologies if this is a really dumb question but I am after > > 1. some advice / suggestions > 2. example(s) of a similar nature I can read about > > As is probably the case with most new inventors, rightly or wrongly I am > not keen to give the game away, so please forgive the lack of detail. > > I have invented / improved an existing product that is used in > photography. There are multiple possible components but focusing ;-) on the > key element I have prototyped it on a 3D printer. I am waiting for some > supplies to finish construction for alpha testing, but fairly confident it > is going to work. > > My thoughts were something along the lines of: > > 1. alpha test / refine based on personal use > 2. approach 1-3 other photographers (with NDA?) to seek beta testing > 3. finalise the design for more generic attachment purposes > 4.. ??? this is where I kind of get stuck. > > It's a fairly specialised piece of equipment, and I do not think it lends > itself to crowdfunding via kickstarter et al for that reason. > It solves 2-3 very real problems - ie it's not just a "me too" product / > solution looking for a problem. > > My initial thoughts have been to > a. approach existing companies who produce similar or complimentary > products and see if they would be interested in licensing my device - or > perhaps buying it outright. They are all overseas. > b. produce the items myself and seeing if I could sell them on consignment > via local photography outlets. Local AU photography shops are all > resellers, as far as I am aware, and do not have their own products, so I > do not think they would seek to manufacture it for me. > > I would be interested in pursuing a patent search if not application - for > the learning experience as much as the ability to afford some IP > protection. I understand there is significant cost involved. > > Assuming the reaction from #2 above (beta test with independent > photographers) is favourable, what would you suggest I do as my next > step(s)? > > Does anyone have quick access to an online account of someone developing a > similarly sized (< $1000) physical product for a subsection of a larger > market (ie not really crowd fundable) and the process they went through to > bring it to that market? > > I have watched many, many kickstarter videos to see how people go about > developing a product and bringing it to their market. KS itself seems to be > a pivotal element of that process. So what's the non-KS way of doing it? > > Upon further reflection, this KS campaign was successful and is a > similarly specialised photography product. Mind you, I only heard about > them when I found some product for sale, second hand, in an FB group: > https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-led-light-cube-for-photographers-filmmakers > > I look forward to your responses. > > Thanks! > Aaron > > -- > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach > Australia mailing list. Vist http://siliconbeachaustralia.org for more > > Forum rules > 1) No lurkers! It is expected that you introduce yourself. > 2) No jobs postings. You can use http://siliconbeachaustralia.org/jobs > > > To post to this group, send email to > silicon-beach-australia@googlegroups.com > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia?hl=en?hl=en > > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Silicon Beach Australia" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach Australia mailing list. Vist http://siliconbeachaustralia.org for more Forum rules 1) No lurkers! It is expected that you introduce yourself. 2) No jobs postings. You can use http://siliconbeachaustralia.org/jobs To post to this group, send email to silicon-beach-australia@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia?hl=en?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Silicon Beach Australia" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to silicon-beach-australia+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
