Thread

1. ac29 · 1786033928 · focus · HN ↗

   Any idea what pricing will be like? The fact that you call out Drone and Defense industries on your page suggests to me this is extremely expensive.

   I recently priced out getting a PCB done in China and its insanely cheap. My design isnt complicated, a few ICs, a few connectors, an a dozen or so passives. PCB manufacturing, parts, and soldering/assembly is on the order of $10-20 total per board and that is with zero volume discounts. The parts alone would cost that much in the US, and I suspect the sort of companies that you contract out to also aren't really interested in tiny orders so they would probably quote huge setup fees (looks like your average order so far is ~$7000).

   1. tamimio · 1786039511 · focus · HN ↗

      It will definitely be expensive, and if you raised any eyebrow, you will get “made in the US” remarks immediately. Regarding “drone”, it’s a buzz word, in the past two years everyone is piggy backing on it like how all industries did with “crypto” years ago and “cyber” years before, or others with “AI” in software world now, “drone” is the word for hardware related, any new product or startup that has hardware involved, you will see this word quickly. I hate it and I hate how they ruined this amazing hobby with all their corporate defense BS, but oh well.

      1. willcarkner · 1786039756 · focus · HN ↗

         It's important to focus on where real innovation in the space is happening, and to me that's in drones. Some of the hype is overstated but drones are the new additions to conflict, and they're clearly not going away.

         1. tamimio · 1786040205 · focus · HN ↗

            A lot of the hype is overstated, and I have been in drone world since 2014, but because of the weaponization of them and the global atmosphere of militarization, there’s a LOT of money pouring in now, so everyone wants a piece of that cake. In reality, their (the fpv ones specifically) success rates are around 1/10, but only the successful ones are shown for obvious reasons.

            Also, I did mention back in 2020 that drones are the only practical type of robotics compared to others, although I meant for good purposes not how they are used right now.

            1. willcarkner · 1786040354 · focus · HN ↗

               Yes even if the success rates are 1/10 they are still causing serious damage for their cost in modern conflicts. Agreed that the hype is overstated.
         2. crtified · 1786041921 · focus · HN ↗

            One of your major choices is how much you want to specialise, vs be a general service. I expect you're in the phase of discovering that. Now, with the disclaimer I'm just a random guy who knows not-much about business - and is just a small hobbyist electronics guy - it seems clear that your stiffest headwinds are at General Service. I would be leery of how much success you'd have there, because general PCB service is something the world has A LOT MORE of than it had 10 years ago, and the economics are on balance unfavourable to you.

            But to (very slightly!) paraphase you, you think it's important to focus on drones/defense and other nationalist areas where the future is canted toward you, and while that is not an area I'd enjoy working in myself (no personal judgement on you, but I'd rather spend my life doing things other than conflict and war), that is clearly what you know to be your first-rank business chance.

            1. willcarkner · 1786043317 · focus · HN ↗

               Yes I agree. If it turns out that there is not enough demand to service in defense, we can use the optimizations found from the defense market to take a stab at the general market. It doesn't make sense to start with that off the bat.
      2. Arch-TK · 1786040944 · focus · HN ↗

         [delayed]

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