Where can I sell my projects?

[Alexandros81]

Hi to all electronics enthusiasts!
I am an electronics engineer that works at home,
and I am currently working on a wireless thermometer project.
I don't have the capability(yet) to go to production with this and I want
to gather money in order in the future to be able to fully produce other products myself.
I was wondering where can I sell my project?

Regards,
Alexandros

[Ampera]

It honestly depends on the scale of your product and production means. If you are talking making stuff to order, maybe buying a box of boards from an etching company, then you could try the EEVBlog forums, or maybe E-Bay.

[ulix]

Hi,

is you product fcc/ce conform? Otherwise (I think) you are not allowed to sell it.
Did you think abou that?

[ataradov]

Tindie works for me.

[Ampera]

Hi,

is you product fcc/ce conform? Otherwise (I think) you are not allowed to sell it.
Did you think abou that?

That is one aspect, but for VERY small production runs (like 10-20 units) I don't imagine it would be a major issue. Still, be on the right side of the law if you intend to do so, you can always get a nasty fine, or in worst case jail time.

[Alexandros81]

It honestly depends on the scale of your product and production means. If you are talking making stuff to order, maybe buying a box of boards from an etching company, then you could try the EEVBlog forums, or maybe E-Bay.

This is still in development.
At the moment I have a microcontroller in breadboard connected to a thermometer module.
uC reads data from thermometer and send data via TTL to USB cable to PC. I am also developing
the PC GUI to display the data and save them to a file or database. Then I will connect the rf tranceiver module
at 868MHz . Also an lcd monitor is considered.
So at one end is the uC, thermometer, lcd and tranceiver and at the other end tranceiver,uC connected to pc.

Well all of this is at the moment in defferent modules and I am thinking in integrating (hopefully) into
two pcb's. Actually I haven't decided yet regarding integration because I don't know which components
are ok to have at the same pcb. Is it ok to have the rf ic at the same board as the thermometer?

Besides that I could possible order from an etching company the pcbs but I don't have the means to
place components myself. I could do a prototype.

So at the moment I am talking about selling technical drawings and code and what other related docs for the prototype.

If I go to production what machines should I be looking at? Say for 100-200pcs a month?

Hi,

is you product fcc/ce conform? Otherwise (I think) you are not allowed to sell it.
Did you think abou that?

Probably i am going to be using a wireless module at 868MHz, like the ones you find in ebay for a start.
Checking with regulations in Europe it is leagal to use it under certain rf specs.

Hi,

is you product fcc/ce conform? Otherwise (I think) you are not allowed to sell it.
Did you think abou that?

That is one aspect, but for VERY small production runs (like 10-20 units) I don't imagine it would be a major issue. Still, be on the right side of the law if you intend to do so, you can always get a nasty fine, or in worst case jail time.

It will be legal.

thanks

[ataradov]

So at the moment I am talking about selling technical drawings and code and what other related docs for the prototype.

Forget about that. If your project takes a couple weeks for a professional to design (sure sounds like it from the description) and it does not offer any unique features, nobody will buy this.

If I go to production what machines should I be looking at? Say for 100-200pcs a month?

You will be looking for a professional board assembly house, not machines.

[TK]

Devices with RF need FCC certification in the US and equivalent certification in EU if it is being sold to end users.  No FCC required if it is classified as test equipment.  Certain development boards also are allowed to be sold without RF certification, but once assembled into final product, it must be certified.

[Alexandros81]

So at the moment I am talking about selling technical drawings and code and what other related docs for the prototype.

Forget about that. If your project takes a couple weeks for a professional to design (sure sounds like it from the description) and it does not offer any unique features, nobody will buy this.

If I go to production what machines should I be looking at? Say for 100-200pcs a month?

You will be looking for a professional board assembly house, not machines.

Unique features, such as?

Devices with RF need FCC certification in the US and equivalent certification in EU if it is being sold to end users.  No FCC required if it is classified as test equipment.  Certain development boards also are allowed to be sold without RF certification, but once assembled into final product, it must be certified.

Does it cost a lot of money?

[ataradov]

Unique features, such as?

Depends on the product. Things that cost money are things involving a lot of RnD and math (AI, voice recognition, etc). It is very unlikely to sell design for a simple microcontroller project. Offering a service of modification for specific use is better, but still, there is no marketplace for things like this. You will basically have to market your services yourself.

Does it cost a lot of money?

FCC certification costs about $15000 if you know what you are doing and can pass it from the first attempt.

But if you are using a certified module, and this module is the only intentional radiator in the system, you can just transfer FCC certification from the module to your device.

[ebastler]

This is still in development.
At the moment I have a microcontroller in breadboard connected to a thermometer module.
uC reads data from thermometer and send data via TTL to USB cable to PC. I am also developing
the PC GUI to display the data and save them to a file or database. Then I will connect the rf tranceiver module
at 868MHz . Also an lcd monitor is considered.
So at one end is the uC, thermometer, lcd and tranceiver and at the other end tranceiver,uC connected to pc.

Well all of this is at the moment in defferent modules and I am thinking in integrating (hopefully) into
two pcb's. Actually I haven't decided yet regarding integration because I don't know which components
are ok to have at the same pcb. Is it ok to have the rf ic at the same board as the thermometer?

So, what end customer and use do you have in mind? This sounds like an application that can already be addressed by so many temperature loggers, remote thermometers, bluetooth multimeters with temperature sensing etc.. Will your design have unique functionality?

It also sounds (pardon me for being direct, no offense intended) like a nice hobby project, put together from Arduinos and off-the-shelf modules from Ali-Express or such. How much engineering expertise and experience do you bring to the table? Can you design this to have e.g. extremely low power consumption, high resolution and precision, extremely low cost, or other differentiating properties?

If the answer is "no" to the questions above, then I am afraid I don't see much promise -- regardless whether you try to sell the design, or try to have it produced and sell the product.

[cdev]

"Gather money"

Nice work if you can get it!

This sounds like "crowd sourcing" to me. You can go to sites that specialize in that kind of thing. Some ideas get quite well funded, others don't.

Hi to all electronics enthusiasts!
I am an electronics engineer that works at home,
and I am currently working on a wireless thermometer project.
I don't have the capability(yet) to go to production with this and I want
to gather money in order in the future to be able to fully produce other products myself.
I was wondering where can I sell my project?

Regards,
Alexandros

[Ampera]

From the sounds of it I honestly would hold off on selling, and possibly see how other companies do it. I can't sit here and say I have any experience in this, but what I can say is that by the looks of it you don't either, and that will be a major issue. If you don't know how this stuff works, then I cannot see you being able to reliably sell something like this.

There are probably thousands of people who are trying to crowd fund their own wireless thermometer, and for something that would just need a microcontroller, an RF module, and a thermistor in essence slapped together, I don't forsee a lot of people buying something that China probably already does cheaper.

This is just my two cents, but obviously since you are an electronics engineer with a job, you should have some of this knowledge down beforehand.

To give constructive criticism, I suggest you possibly do more. What I mean by that is add something to your product that will make it reasonably worthwhile to market it. Most products like this are marketed, manufactured, and distributed by large firms, and while hobbyists/makers can make a business of selling their stuff, it's a lot harder, especially if there is already a mass market alternative.

[buck converter]

Submit to Tayda Electronics, they sell it, give you 10-15%, never done this personally, but was looking at it
http://www.taydaelectronics.com/share

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[b_force]

Hi,

is you product fcc/ce conform? Otherwise (I think) you are not allowed to sell it.
Did you think abou that?

You're joking right?

99% of the boards/shields/addons/arduinos and what not that you can buy are absolutely not FCC/CE certified.

[ataradov]

99% of the boards/shields/addons/arduinos and what not that you can buy are absolutely not FCC/CE certified.

That's because they don't have radios. And the ones that have radios are certified. That's why they always use modules for radio functions.

[b_force]

99% of the boards/shields/addons/arduinos and what not that you can buy are absolutely not FCC/CE certified.

That's because they don't have radios. And the ones that have radios are certified. That's why they always use modules for radio functions.

Well, as far as I know, everything that switches can be seen as a radio.
So like step up/down converters, SMPS, Class-D amplifiers.
For all these products you 'officially' need a CE/FCC license.

But anyway, there are also lots of wireless modules that are definitely not FCC certified.
I personally wouldn't be to bothered about it as long as you sell it for hobbyist.
Or just make sure you use certified wifi modules.

[ataradov]

Well, as far as I know, everything that switches can be seen as a radio.
So like step up/down converters, SMPS, Class-D amplifiers.
For all these products you 'officially' need a CE/FCC license.

No. FCC differentiates between intentional and unintentional radiators. They are covered by different parts of the regulations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title_47_CFR_Part_15

But yes, you need to claim compliance. But for unintentional radiators you don't need to pass actual certification and pay money to anyone. But your device must be able to pass this test, if compliance is challenged.

But anyway, there are also lots of wireless modules that are definitely not FCC certified.

Well, there are a lot of people robbing stores. It does not make it less of a crime.

[b_force]

It does not make it less of a crime.

That depends on your definition of it and how it's being used.

I am already well aware of these regulations btw.
(hence my earlier response)

My point is that it wouldn't be the first advice I would give someone.
It just scares people off.
In fact, in my career I have even seen many (smaller) companies doing FCC/CE certifications just much later on the track.
It's something that you need to keep in the back of your mind, but as always it totally depends on the context.
Because in some cases/countries/fields you actually need to retest the whole product, EVEN if it only contains parts that are already certified on their own.
To make it even more confusing, there are also cases/countries/fields where that's not needed at all (like computers for example, but a lot of others things).

The point is, as long as you use modules that are already certified or you are sure that your product is performing similar or better, it's not a big deal.
The reason why, is because you simply don't want to have any (destructive) interference with something else and therefor might sue you or something.
It's simple as that, nothing more, nothing less.

My advice would be, get a good sense what is needed to make a product that's sellable.
Is there a market for it, how can you optimize things etc.
Also DO get a good sense how it's performing, will it cause interference, how is it keeping up with other products?
Maybe you can add something to it to even prevent these issues?
Or can you maybe use parts that are already certified (like these little wifi modules)?
Next, try to sell it to hobbyist, low-profile, testers
If that all works and you get a good sense of that's actually going to be a good selling product ready for high(er) production, get a proper FCC/CE/UL certificate.

Ones again, in my professional career I have seen MANY companies working this way.
I personally also don't think it's a crime ate all, unless you deliberately and intentionally are going to make a mess.
Also, in most countries you will get first a bunch of warnings to get your stuff right.

[hermit]

You are working backwards.  First you identify a need.  That identifies the potential customers and the marketplace they are likely to frequent.  It sounds like you picked something you wanted to build on the assumption you would later find a market.  You really haven't offered enough detail about the item for anyone to be of any real help.

Who do you THINK would buy it?  For what purpose?

[cdev]

If you are using a wireless module that is certified by regulatory agencies then that settles it. Its only if you were making something that wasnt certified and selling it that you might run into problems due to its lack of compliance with these regulations. Depending on what frequencies it uses and what kind of signal is being emitted. There are frequencies that may be okay to transmit on with no license - within certain power and possibly antenna limitations.. Also, the key issue from a logical standpoint is not to cause unwelcome interference to anybody. very simple stuff. That would be a question that varied by country and the thing to do would be to ask the regulatory agency what exact laws applied and read and follow them. Better safe than sorry.


The rules arent onerous, they are there so that the resource is best used to everybody's benefit.

[thermistor-guy]

... I am an electronics engineer that works at home,
and I am currently working on a wireless thermometer project.
I don't have the capability(yet) to go to production with this and I want
to gather money in order in the future to be able to fully produce other products myself...
Regards,
Alexandros

I know how hard this is. Good luck. Few people have the ability to switch between all the roles necessary for a business - creator, business manager, marketer, producer. Walt Disney was one.

Some products succeed big-time - like rpi  - and some don't - like the Inmos Transputer.

As it happens, I have a need for something to monitor and log temperatures in domestic refrigerators over 12 to 24 hrs. A couple of cheap wireless thermometers that can work down to -20 deg. C would be useful.

As an engineer, the sort of products I tend to buy, rather than make (or make do without), are: T&M equipment, protocol/interface converters (e.g. ethernet-to-GPIB, ethernet-to-serial), development kits/boards. You're first product is in the T&M category, so I'd certainly look at it.

One feature I would appreciate, and that may not have occurred to you, is the size of the unit. I have access to a Fluke/Hart Scientific 9170 temperature well:

http://www.fluke.com/fluke/auen/process-calibration-tools/temperature-calibrators/fcal-9170-9171-metrology-well-calibrators.htm?pid=71353

If your unit could fit in the well, and accepted calibration settings, then I could calibrate it. This would be a valuable feature for me. Provided they are accurate and stable enough, your thermometer units now become useful for various industrial/DIY uses - something for you to consider.

Good luck.

[batteksystem]

He still have to produce it to sell on tindie. I think he is looking for somebody to buy his work (schematic, firmware, layout etc.)

[BrianHG]

Warning not about the FCC/radio emissions, but the UL safety cert.  If you are getting away without such a cert, for a low quantity of sales, you are safe until someone gets hurt, or a fire on some property happens.  Then if your product is anywhere near the associated problem, they will come after you and it will be your burden to prove that your product did not create or extenuate the problem.

In the past, I used to not worry about such things as small sales in only a few hundred and powering my devices by battery or a UL/CE approved wall transformer was ok enough.  But 2 main issues which means reversing this rule are:

1.  High quantity and international sales.  The numbers and international law will work against you here...  And if you are doing the numbers, approvals is the way to go.
2.  Thanks to lithium batteries catching fire in the new with faulty devices, now even battery powered tech will require safety approvals...